By midday, Kendo had dismantled one of his unfinished short swords.
He scraped away the weaker steel core and replaced it with a narrow vein of the new metal, stretching the fragment as thinly as possible through repeated heating and folding.
The process was delicate. Too much force, and the metal resisted. Too little, and it refused to bond.
When he finished, the blade looked almost ordinary.
Almost.
Rollo leaned against the wall as Kendo balanced it in his palm.
"You're planning to test that outside town, aren't you?"
"Yes."
"With who?"
"With you."
Rollo did not hesitate. "Fine."
They waited until dusk, when lower-tier hunters gathered near the outskirts for routine patrols. An F-tier horned wolf had been spotted in the tree line earlier that week.
The creature emerged sooner than expected.
Lean. Scarred. Hungry.
It lunged toward Rollo first.
Rollo braced himself and struck with the upgraded sword.
The blade bit deep.
Deeper than it ever had before.
The wolf howled and twisted, attempting to clamp onto Rollo's forearm, but Kendo stepped in and drove the dagger beneath its ribs.
The fight ended quickly.
Too quickly.
Rollo pulled the sword free and stared at the blood along its fuller.
"That was easier than it should've been."
Kendo crouched beside the corpse, examining the wound channels. The metal had sliced through muscle and bone without warping.
Nearby, two independent hunters who had been tracking the wolf approached cautiously.
They studied the kill.
"That blade of yours?" one asked Rollo.
Rollo glanced at Kendo briefly before answering. "New batch."
The hunter frowned. "Looked like E-tier penetration."
"It wasn't," Kendo said evenly.
The men exchanged uncertain glances.
As they left, one muttered, "Strange."
Rollo wiped the blade clean. "You're going to draw attention."
"I know."
"You're not worried?"
Kendo looked toward the northern ridge where the disposal grounds lay beyond sight.
"I'm not done yet."
That night, when he cleaned the blade, he noticed something new — faint lines beneath the surface, like veins forming inside the steel.