Kieran's whisper hung in the humid, metal-scented air of the forge, a tentative question offered to the universe and to the shimmering length of steel resting on his workbench. The answer did not come as words, not really. It was a knowing, a certainty that bloomed in his mind like a deep-sea flower unfurling in the abyss. It was the essence of crashing waves and still tidal pools, of relentless currents and the moon's quiet pull. It was a name that was the thing itself.
"Tidecaller," he breathed, the syllables feeling both strange and utterly familiar on his tongue.
As he spoke it aloud, the air in the forge seemed to still, the ever-present heat haze shimmering with a new, azure light. The System window materialized before his eyes, its neutral text scrolling in a cascade that stole the breath from his lungs.
[ARTIFACT CREATED]
[Name: Tidecaller]
[Rank: S]
[Type: Longsword]
[Creator: Kieran Ashford]
The word hammered into his consciousness with the force of a physical blow. S. It glowed with a subtle, terrifying luminescence, a grade he had seen only in history tomes and legends. It was the rank reserved for relics that shaped battles, that defined eras. Not for something born in a provincial forge in Millhaven.
He read on, a numb dread settling in his stomach even as a traitorous sliver of artisan's pride tried to spark.
[Base Stats:]
[Damage: 220-280]
[Attack Speed: +25%]
[Critical Chance: +20%]
[Durability: Self-Repairing (water exposure)]
The numbers were absurd. Dawnbreaker's damage range had been impressive at 180-230. This was another tier entirely. Self-repairing? That was a property of ancient, storied weapons, not of something he had just finished quenching.
[Passive Skill: Tidal Affinity]
[Water-based abilities gain +60% effectiveness when channeled through this weapon]
[Wielder gains water breathing and enhanced underwater mobility]
[Passive Skill: Current Manipulation]
[Can control and redirect water within 30-foot radius]
[Water damage increased by 35%]
[Passive Skill: Adaptive Flow]
[Weapon's balance and weight adjust to optimal configuration based on environment]
[Effectiveness increases by 25% in or near water]
The skills unfolded, each more impossible than the last. This wasn't just a sword; it was a locus of elemental power. It granted abilities that would make a master Hydromancer weep. Adaptive Flow was a smithing dream—a weapon that perfectly suited itself to its wielder's need in any situation.
[Active Skill: Riptide]
[Cooldown: 60 seconds]
[Create a devastating water vortex centered on the blade]
[Damage scales with wielder's power and proximity to water source]
[Special Property: Ocean's Heart]
[This weapon resonates with the fundamental nature of water itself]
[Cannot be wielded effectively by those who fight against water's nature]
[Quality: Masterwork]
[This artifact exceeds its creator's previous best work]
The final line was the cruelest twist. Exceeds its creator's previous best work. The System itself was confirming it. This was no fluke, no fortunate accident. This was a deliberate, if unconscious, step beyond what he had already achieved.
Kieran stared, his mind a white-noise roar of denial. The beautiful, terrible truth was undeniable, printed in light before him.
S-rank.
Not A-rank like Dawnbreaker. Not a proud successor. A transcendent leap.
"No," he said aloud, the word sharp and brittle in the quiet forge. "That's not—I didn't mean to—it was supposed to be good, solid, a worthy follow-up, not—"
But the System was infallible in its classifications. Tidecaller was S-rank. Objectively, measurably, devastatingly better than Dawnbreaker. Better than anything Kieran had ever dreamed of creating when he'd lit the forge that morning. He had sought to prove his first masterpiece was no accident, to quiet the doubting voice in his own head and those he imagined in the wider world.
Instead, he had proven he was capable of something far more dangerous.
"Oh no," Kieran whispered, the horror dawning like a slow, cold tide rising in his chest. His fingers, which had so carefully polished the blade, now felt icy. "Oh no, no, no—"
The forge door burst open with a crash that echoed off the anvils. Mira rushed in, her usually composed face etched with wild urgency, her eyes wide.
"Kieran! The System notification—it flashed across the town channel for high-tier creations—did you just—" Her words died as her gaze found Tidecaller on the workbench. She saw not just the physical sword, but the way the very air around it glistened with condensed moisture, how the light bent through a permanent, barely-there mist. She saw the aura, a deep, pulsating blue that screamed of power and rarity. The unmistakable S-rank resonance. Her breath hitched. "Oh. Oh, fuck."
"It was supposed to be A-rank," Kieran said, his voice desperate, pleading as if she could somehow contradict the System. "Maybe a high B-rank if I was off my game. I wasn't trying to make something this… this cataclysmic. It just… happened. The materials sang together, the enchantments fused, and it just… became this."
"An S-rank artifact 'just happened.'" Mira's laugh was short, slightly hysterical, devoid of any real humor. She took a step closer, not to touch the sword, but to better witness the calamity. "Do you have any idea what this means? Kieran, this isn't just valuable. This is a geopolitical event. The Empire's Artificer Corps will have a mandatory confiscation order for any S-rank gear created outside imperial forges. The Sanctum will declare it a 'dangerous divine instrument' too powerful for secular hands and demand its surrender for 'safekeeping.'" She sucked in a sharp breath. "The Consortium—"
Kieran finished for her, his voice flat. "The Consortium is going to lose their collective, profit-obsessed minds. They'll see a marketing tool, a leverage point, and a massive, massive risk all at once."
"The Consortium is going to see dollar signs and political capital so vast it's terrifying," Mira corrected, her strategic mind already racing ahead. "But they'll also see a target painted on their backs. Kieran, we need to think about this with cold, brutal logic. If word gets out that you, a relatively unknown blacksmith in a backwater town, made an S-rank artifact—"
"When word gets out," Kieran interrupted, the bitterness coating his tongue. "Lord Wavecrest isn't a discreet man. He's flamboyant. The moment he straps this to his hip and steps onto a battlefield or even a royal court, everyone with a hint of perception will know. And they won't just ask where he got it. They'll descend on Millhaven to find the artisan who can spit out S-rank weapons. They'll pick this place apart looking for me."
They stood in a heavy, suffocating silence, the only sound the soft, almost melodic drip… drip… of water forming on Tidecaller's crossguard and falling to the stone floor. The sword pulsed with a gentle, oceanic light, beautiful and terrible, a monument to craft that was now an unbearable liability.
"We could destroy it," Mira said, the words so quiet they were almost swallowed by the ambient hum of the forge's cooling enchantments. "We could stage an accident. A quenching crack that propagated. A magical feedback during the final enchantment. We start over, forge something excellent but unexceptional. A solid A-rank. Safer."
Kieran looked at her as if she'd suggested cutting off his own hand. "Destroy it? I can't—Mira, this is…" He gestured helplessly at the blade. "This is a piece of soul. It's the purest expression of my craft I've ever achieved. To even think of taking a hammer to it…" The thought alone made him feel physically ill, a deep, visceral revulsion.
"I know," Mira said, her voice softening. She understood the artist's heart, even as the pragmatist in her screamed for the safer path. She reached out, not for the sword, but to squeeze his tense shoulder. "I know you can't. But we had to voice the option. We had to look into that abyss."
"Then what do we do?" His question was barely a whisper, the question of a man trapped by his own genius.
"We do the job," Mira said, squaring her shoulders, her face settling into lines of grim resolve. "We deliver it to Lord Wavecrest as per the commission. We fulfill our contract with the Consortium, collect our fee, and maintain every shred of professionalism. And then, the moment the gold is in our hands, we prepare. We fortify the forge. We lay contingency plans. We watch the horizon." She moved to the window, looking out at Millhaven's peaceful, muddy streets, at the unsuspecting townsfolk going about their day. "Because this changes everything, Kieran. An A-rank smith is a valuable asset. An S-rank smith isn't an asset; he's a strategic resource. He's a prize, a threat, and a weapon all in one. Nations have gone to war over less."
Kieran sank heavily onto his worn stool, the familiar seat offering no comfort. Tidecaller lay within arm's reach, a siren call of perfection and peril. It pulsed with a power he'd never meant to unleash, a testament to a capability he now feared.
He'd wanted to prove Dawnbreaker wasn't a fluke.
Mission accomplished, he thought with a savage, internal irony.
Now he just had to survive the consequences.
The remaining days before Lord Wavecrest's arrival passed in a blur of obsessive, meticulous activity. Kieran poured his anxiety into details so fine that no one but him would ever notice or care.
He spent a full day crafting the scabbard. It was not an afterthought, but a companion piece. He used treated Kraken leather, impossibly tough yet supple, tooled with wave patterns that mirrored the blade's fuller. The reinforcement plates were forged from the same batch of deep-sea steel, etched with minute, interlocking runes for impact dispersion. Inside, he lined it with a self-cleaning, oil-impregnated velvet that would maintain the blade's lethal edge indefinitely. He enchanted the scabbard itself with minor but potent utilities: perfect waterproofing, a repulsion of dirt and grime, and a subtle preservation field that would keep Tidecaller in its current, flawless state for centuries. The sword would be cared for, even if its wielder was negligent.
He engraved his maker's mark on the tang—a stylized 'A' embraced by waves. This time, he made it clear, deliberate, and deep. Hiding seemed not only pointless but suddenly cowardly. If this sword was going to shake the world, it would bear his name without apology.
He polished Tidecaller not just to a shine, but to a mirror finish so profound it became a dark, liquid pool. He could see his own exhausted, worried reflection in its surface with perfect, cruel clarity. The flowing patterns in the steel, the result of the thousand-fold folding and the magic's infusion, no longer just looked like ocean currents; they seemed to move when viewed from the corner of the eye, frozen moments of a perpetual, silent storm.
And late at night, when the forge was dark and silent save for the embers' glow, he would sometimes lift Tidecaller from its rack. He wouldn't swing it, just hold its perfect balance, feeling the thrum of oceanic power through his gloves.
"I'm sorry," he whispered one such night, the confession swallowed by the darkness. "You're perfect. You're everything a weapon should be and more. You're art and purpose fused. But I was thinking of metallurgy and challenge, not of… politics. Of greed. You're going to cause so much trouble. People will fight over you, kill for you, betray for you. Kingdoms might fracture for the secret of you. And I created you, knowing, on some level, that this might happen. My pride brought you into a world that isn't ready for you."
Tidecaller, in response, would pulse with a soft, azure light, and water would condense along its length in intricate, lace-like patterns of frost and dew. It did not judge. It held no malice or ambition. It simply was—a perfect expression of craft, obsession, and a creator's desperate, unspoken need to touch the sublime.
On the morning Lord Wavecrest was scheduled to arrive, Kieran wrapped the ensconced Tidecaller in layers of midnight-blue silk, the final act of swaddling a newborn that was also a weapon of mass destruction. He tried to steel himself, to adopt Mira's pragmatic resolve. He rehearsed calm statements, practiced a neutral expression in his reflection.
He failed completely.
Some things were beyond preparation. Some consequences were woven into the act of creation itself, inevitable from the moment the hammer struck the enchanted metal and the first rune flared to life. You could not craft a sun and then complain about the heat.
As noon approached, the normal sounds of Millhaven—the chatter from the market, the clang from the other smithies—were gradually overtaken by the distinct, authoritative sound of hooves on cobblestones. Not the lazy clop of a farmer's cart, but the synchronized, disciplined rhythm of a military escort. He heard the jingle of harnesses, the creak of fine leather, the murmur of curious townsfolk gathering.
Kieran took one last, long look around his forge. At the anvil, dented from years of honest work. At the quenching trough, still holding traces of Tidecaller's magical chill. At the tool racks, every hammer and tong in its place. This was his sanctuary, his home, the simple kingdom of heat and metal where he had been master. It was the place where he'd accidentally, gloriously, created something that would shatter that simplicity forever.
The knocking came—not a request, but an announcement.
Kieran's hand closed around the silk-wrapped bundle. The power within it hummed against his palm, a promise and a threat.
"Here we go," he muttered to the empty room, to the ghosts of all his simpler creations.
And opened the door to face his future.