ShangriLa Frontier Chapter 419 Part 2
ShangriLa Frontier Chapter 419: Side Story 15 – Urakata Standby – Part 2
[Eh? Eeh, what’s that supposed to be……? Twin Core Crystal of some sorts……? EEEHHH!? No way, the amount of this material is five hundred!? FIVE……!? HUNDRED……!? Are you serious……!?]
Imron tried to call out to Sanraku and ask for more information, but the man in question was already well on his way from the workshop. However, right before leaving, Sanraku came to a stop, as if he suddenly realized or remembered something important. He then turned around and opened his mouth, and the words that came out of it were quiet, but they were more than enough to light a bright flame inside of Imron’s heart.
[Oh yeah, that’s right. I suppose that it is only fair for you to know about that, huh? You see, you are not the only one who I came to for blacksmithing services. You see, I also gave the same amount of materials…… to the one who created those little babies. Alright, see you later!]
[…… I… I see?]
When it comes to the weapon creation process in ShangriLa Frontier, it can be roughly divided into four distinct stages, each equally as important as the other ones.
The first stage is the level of the magic skill “Forge Rise”, a skill that is unique only to the profession of a blacksmith. This step is the most crucial and it cannot be bypassed in any sort of way. Of course, if you want to be a successful blacksmith you need to have this skill leveled up as much as possible. Needless to say, since Imron managed to attain the rank of a “Master” at blacksmithing, the level of her “Forge Rise” has been maxed out for quite a while now.
Second one is the quality of the equipment used to create new items or strengthen the already existing ones. This step is basically like producing music, you can either use a shared workshop that has everything you might need but its quality is never going to be the highest possible, or you might want to buy your own blacksmith workshop and customize it for your own personal taste and needs. So this step greatly depends on what you want and what you are able to afford, and it can oftentimes make or break an aspiring blacksmith and the items they choose to create.
However, it is not just a matter of preparing a furnace and taking proper care of one’s tools and equipment. If you want to create better and better items you need to be on the lookout to constantly upgrade the content of your workshop, just like Break did a while ago when she ordered a brand new furnace that would be able to facilitate all of her needs.
Thirdly, there is the matter of the quality of the materials themselves. In this game there exists a statistic called “Resource”. It is a statistic that is set for the materials that can be used to create weapons. The higher this statistic is, the more freedom and reproducibility the materials would give, and their “abilities” would also be of higher grade than in case of the lower stat materials. Of course, this system is designed in such a way that using high grade materials may even result in obtaining additional effects for the weapons, ones that the blacksmith did not intended or expected to infuse into the weapon.
However, there are also “cursed materials” that give various demerit effects to the equipment instead of having positive additions, and they tend to lower the overall grade of the final product. So there is a need for balancing those two statistics out…… Incidentally the value of the materials form the Emperor Scorpion that Sanraku has left in Imrod’s care sits at around five hundred points. For comparison, the material with the highest resource points among the items dropped by the other users are: dragon scales are one hundred twenty points, the Illustrious Bone of Atlantic Reaperorca is four hundred and fifty points, and scarlet bones are seven hundred and fifty.
As an interesting side note here, the highest amount of resource points in “Scarlet Scale” and sits at the value of one thousand.
And then finally…… There is the actual skill of the blacksmith himself/herself.
In the weapon making mode, the shape of the weapon, that is, the appearance, length and shape can be determined in several ways, but only when making a one-of-a-kind weapon, the appearance of the weapon designed by the system is automatically determined every time and cannot be changed.
The simplest pattern is to go full-auto…… Strictly speaking, it means that the system will automatically guide you through the entire process, allowing you for some personal touches and modifications here and there.
And the other option is to create a weapon completely by manual means. The design can be decided by the player’s thoughts and actual hand movements. Imron often uses such method since she has always found it to be more satisfying.
Imron’s imagination was naturally pretty vivid and wild, so it could be said that the ShangriLa Frontier’s system was ideal for her in every possible way.
[Hmm? Oh…… I have arrived, huh? …… Hmm?]
Far from the urban area, there is a place where a whole lot of greenery and plants are still remaining…… In short, Luka finally arrived at the station where she was getting off, a pretty rural part of the city, a place where her mind was finally starting to get back to peace after that crazy announcement and the amount of work she had to deal with…… But then, all of a sudden, she turned her gaze towards a small object that was hanging from the side of her purse.
[Theatrical Superhero Actorman…… THAT’S RIGHT!!!]
Luka was staring at the key chain related to the old tokusatsu show that used to be aired on TV when she was still little, but at the moment, the image emerges in her mind like a lightning bolt completely out of the blue and she had a flash of inspiration.
[Oh! Hey! That’s it! That’s what I’ve been waiting for!]
Luka shouts inside of the empty train car. In ShanFro, the player can set not only the appearance of the weapon but also the effects the weapon will have.
However, the cost required to set the effects also depends on the amount of resource points, so you can say that blacksmithing in ShanFro was also a battle with resource points.
Performance needs to be sacrificed if appearance is to be prioritized, and appearance is going to be mediocre at best if performance is to be prioritized.
The Holy Sword Excalibur owned by Saiga-100 is something that many players seen and heard about. And since everyone knows of its existence, probably because of its position and splendor, many counterfeit replicas are on the market as of late.
However, they are usually just flashy chunks of useless metal because all the points needed for their creation needed to be put into appearance.
Since the materials from the Crystal Emperor Scorpion have such overwhelming amount of resource points, it is possible to achieve both the image that Luka had in mind as well as achieve the performance that is suitable for it, even if it is not going to be the strongest sword out there.
[THE DOORS ARE ABOUT TO CLOSE.]
[Heee? Oh, no!!! W-Wait! Wait a minute……! Wait, wait, wait, wait…… Obueh!?]
Sekiguchi Luka. Your typical, run-of-the-mill twenty seven years-old Office Lady who at that exact moment had her face sandwiched in between the doors of the train car that were about to close. That’s what you get for trying to get off the train in a hurry and not pay any attention to your surroundings……
Hobbies: watching superheroes shows –– the Power Rangers kind of superhero shows.
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