The Runesmith

“Another vague title…”

Roland glanced at the new title that he received after finishing this new armor set of his. To his surprise, after it was all done the world’s system allowed him to name this item. It was quite the finicky method as the first words that he blurred out were applied to this item.

‘What would have happened if I said some random words? Would it register anything or does the intent count?’

It was a good question but he probably wouldn’t ever find out. If he ended up making another named item it would be better to not give it a stupid name. If he was able to perform this act then probably other people were also able. Considering this existed the analyzing skill should have been able to identify this new runic set of armor he made. Thus Roland picked up one of the gauntlets to give it a look. To his surprise, a few new things showed up besides the usual metal composition.

‘Could this be the function of the title?’

What his eyes focused on was the classification of this gauntlet which gave him a unique one. He wasn’t sure what it meant but some of his old game knowledge gave him an idea about what it entailed. Before he confirmed the hypothesis his gaze landed on the set bonus that included six parts. The bonuses weren’t that bad and the increase in flat damage just for wearing a suit of armor was a nice surprise.

‘Six parts… Does it only count the main parts of the armor set?’

From what he could gather the system decided to divide his armor into six main parts. The boots included the sabaton and greaves. The pants probably included the cuisses and what was below his waistline. Cuirass for the chest piece, gauntlets for the hands, pauldrons along with the rerebrace, and finally the helmet.

‘Does it discount the Silvergrace suit or does it see it as a part of the whole set?’

Some tests were in order before he figured everything out. His theory about the new title was easily confirmed after he used his identifying skill on some other items around the smithy. The sword that he got from his fight with Emmerson had the highest rank for the classification bit and gave him an idea of how they were graded until that point.

The lowest thing he could find was one of the old iron tools that he had made sometime in the beginning. It was of the ‘crude’ classification and this was probably the lowest grade possible. After that was the common classification and it was followed by the uncommon one which was his durasteel shield. Rare came afterward and he was actually able to discover items like that among his creations.

This showed that the materials that the items were made weren’t the only thing this classification accounted for. It was possible to have a better version of the same item and perhaps the enchantments included on them made the difference. The longsword had a higher tier 2 spell placed on it while the shield just had a simple tier 1 mana shield on it.

Crude, common, uncommon, rare, and then there was unique. For some reason, this naming scheme didn’t fully stick with Roland. Unique was synonymous with one-of-a-kind, it didn’t really go along with the other four names.

‘Could there be an irregular category that the system isn’t able to fully measure? Well, It doesn’t really matter that much, I just need to start identifying more items.’

This new title gave him the ability to see the classification of items and also any set bonuses that they had. It would allow him to pick up better items from a pile without the need of going through their metallic composition or getting too close. It would provide him with information when facing off against opponents. Someone decked out in rare items or above would pose more of a threat than someone adorning common weapons.

‘I don’t have much time left, I need to move to the testing phase… but before that.’

Roland turned off all the recent prompts and was about to give the armor a test run. The last thing on his mind was his first level-up. His level reached one hundred seventy-seven and he was curious about how many stat points he received from his new class. When it came to tier 1 classes usually all the gains were capped out at one point. Then moving on to tier 2 classes they were doubled to two points a level. Now that he was tier 3 it was probable that he could gain four or three stat points a level up.

‘Hm… it seems that three is the maximal number… but I’m not getting anything under two points so it’s a big improvement over tier 2.’

After using this level-up as an indication for future level-ups he was shocked. This meant that he would receive a minimum of two hundred points in each stat until reaching max level of his Runesmith Overlord class. While his class was a bit special this didn’t mean that the other tier 3 class holders would be that far behind.

‘This does explain the discrepancy between tiers, there is no way someone at a lower tier could compete with such a stat difference.’

It was clear that the gap between tiers continued to grow, the chasm just got more massive. Roland thought back to the time that he fought the Lich and the miracle of his surviving the confrontation. If he was facing off against any other creature that didn’t have an obvious weakness then more than likely he would have been dead. Now he had reached this stage but it wasn’t over as stronger foes awaited.

The next confrontation was already scheduled as Theodore Valerian decided to send out some people to pick up Emmerson. It was probable that at least one other Knight Commander would appear and perhaps be accompanied by other tier 3 class holders. Just like Arthur hired Platinum Adventurers, the same could be done by his older brother that possessed deeper pockets. The group could potentially outrank the five Arthur hired. It might be up to him to do most of the heavy lifting if anything went wrong.

‘I don’t think they’ll go for another confrontation this early but I need to get ready for any potential fights.’

Roland looked at the large greatsword that Emmerson was using. It would be a slap to his face to have it on him while the man was being released. He didn’t really have a choice though, there was no time to make a new weapon for himself. There were only two days left and that would be only enough to perform a few tests on his armor and maybe replacing the enchantments on this sword was possible. It all depended on how many tweaks to his new armor he would have to make.

‘Would be better if I did this somewhere else…’

Roland arrived at the testing facility. Previously he destroyed the place and almost collapsed the roof above him when he was first playing around with his Overlord’s Might skill. He made sure not to place this large chamber directly under his house but if it was destroyed then a few of his wind generators would collapse along with it. His power had become superhuman and simple rock walls were not enough to contain the magical blasts or even punches that he could produce.

‘I need to make this larger, the ceiling is too close too… Maybe making some construction golems won’t be a bad idea, I don’t really want anyone snooping around this place.’

After giving out a sigh he got to it. The Silvergrace suit that he created was already around his body and quite the tight fit. It didn’t leave much to the imagination as he wasn’t wearing much under it. Besides the underwear to cover his nether regions the rest of his body was exposed. Transferring mana was much easier through skin contact and he wanted to have as much of an advantage while using this set as possible.

Finally, the various parts of the armor started floating around. The mage hand spell was fully utilized to get them in the correct locations for integration. There was no real need for leather straps anymore as the suit had been designed with latches and clasps in mind. When it was in the correct location a magical signal would push every piece together and slightly magnetize everything to the bendy metal suit.

‘I could probably make this more streamlined…’

Just as he could use the mage hands it could be done through runic items. It was possible to program in a dressing-up sequence where the armor used the spell by itself while using the Silvergrace suit as a reference. He could already see himself T-posing while the armor parts flew to him from the other side of the room. For now, at least, he needed to get through this in a slow and steady fashion by placing the parts one by one.

Last came the helmet that he just placed over his head with the help of his own two hands. For a moment he deliberated about making a large movable face part which would open up as a hood of a car upwards. Yet after considering the time and how the moving parts would introduce weak points to the design, he decided against it. Perhaps in the future when making a Mark 2 version, he would implement such a solution but for now, this would be it.

The visor was slightly larger than his older design and when being used gave out a lighter glow. Through it, he was able to see everything unperturbed and with the advantage of miniaturized screens on the side. Those screens would allow him to see his blindspots with the help of a few golem eyes that were hidden in the back portion of this helmet. The image would be a bit hazy but enough to warn him about any potential threats.

‘I’ve gained some size with this armor on.’

The first thing he realized was the increase in his height which now reached two meters. This combined with all the armored pieces gave him a more intimidating appearance of a tier 3 Knight Commander. He still needed to add a cape to fit the role but at least in appearance, he did look the part.

‘Okay, let’s run some diagnostics while I give it a little jog.’

With the dawn of tier 3 runic constructs came an improvement to the all-around runic operating system. It was like moving from DOS which required many prompt inputs to Windows which actually had a proper graphical interface to work with. It was possible for him to have it send out a small mana jolt through all the traces to check if any of them were being blocked.

While it was doing that Roland took the first step forward. The boots he was wearing had a bit of a footprint so it took him a moment to get used to his new frame. Yet after a few minutes, he was casually sprinting around the testing facility without hearing any crunching or screeching from metallic parts rubbing against each other.

‘The system really helps with the measurements, it’s just like on the schematic.’

He had to give it up to the skills that he gained. After following the plans that he drew up himself he managed to make the perfect replica. The weight distribution was perfect and it didn’t feel awkward to move in this armor piece at all. It was even possible for him to jump and perform some kicking motions without too much of a problem. Yet the weight was still there, if he gained too much momentum it became harder to stop.

Obviously, some time needed to be spent on training before he fully mastered this new piece of equipment. Before mastering it fully he would need to be careful and perhaps relying on powerful tier 3 spells was the way out. His hand moved forward and he pointed out with his palm on a set of slabs of metal. The first one was a block of iron after it was steel and behind him durasteel.

At the bottom of his palm was a circle that started glowing pale blue. Soon it switched to a brighter red color before firing a superheated energy bolt at the blocks of metal. A loud bang hit his ears as it connected with the target and quickly melted right through it. Both the iron and steel blocks were not able to resist at all and only until it got to the last one did the attack subside.

‘Those weren’t thin sheets of metal either…’

Roland compared this little hand blaster to the large mana cannon he designed to defeat the tier 3 monster skeletons. This one shot wasn’t that far off from the power of that mana drill and he wasn’t even utilizing it to full capacity. With how spammable this palm blaster was compared to the bulky mana cannon, it was a massive improvement.

The testing continued with him trying out a couple of different spell combinations. This brought the first problem to the forefront and one of the downsides of this armor set compared to the other one. Greater runic spells were a lot more complicated than common ones. This caused somewhat of a control issue in the operating system through which he was activating it.

His suit of armor was clearly lagging behind and even when utilizing his multiple minds it was becoming problematic. Spells that he could utilize in a matter of seconds was his biggest advantage over other people. He was still ahead of mages comparable to his level but creating grand spells would put a strain on the system.

‘Should I try alleviating this or go with another approach? A few golems and the bits could buy me enough time to initiate the spell. It takes time for the mana to go through the larger structure of a greater rune, could there be a way to hasten the process?’

For the time being he decided to leave this problem alone. Besides attacking spells he wanted to test something different. The first tier 3 spell that he analyzed had been the levitation spell. It was capable of moving objects and the caster up in the air and reducing falling speed. However, was it really capable of only that?

For this test to proceed he needed to get outside where there was no ceiling. The moon was shining out brightly as he had worked into the late hours as always. Agni was there to greet him and was not fooled by the new armor set at all.

“Woof!”

“Give me some space Agni, I don’t want to crash into you.”

“Woo?”

The wolf moved his head sideways as if he wasn’t sure what his master meant. Roland tried to ignore the lazy wolf that just sat down next to one of the windmills. Their spinning blades continued to generate a little bit of sound as he got ready for a little experiment.

His body blinked a few times as the spell was activated. The feeling of weightlessness took over as the levitation spell commenced. With a little jump upwards he started floating and gained a whole five meters in height before slowly descending down to the ground. After a few hops around the compound, he was getting the hang of it.

‘Should I go for it?’

Roland asked himself as he wasn’t sure that this was a good idea. The levitation spell was usually meant for reducing fall damage or rising into the air to reach locations that were inaccessible to the caster. What he was about to do was inspired by his modern mind and too many shows with flying robots.

After another jump, the soles on his metallic boots started giving off a red glow. He had decided to utilize a similar propulsion system that existed in rockets. With the levitation spell active there was not much weight for his rocket boots to lift and thus he started gaining altitude.

“Woah… Is it actually working? I can see the whole house from here”

Roland’s expression wasn’t visible but under the helmet, he was actually smiling. He was rising up into the air and could even see the city of Albrook. It was filled with many small lights that represented torches and moving city guards patrolling the area. In the other direction, he could even see the dungeon that had its opening illuminated as well.

“Wait…”

His mind was brought back to reality as he realized that he had gone too far up. When glancing down his home was quite a distance away. While his mind remained calm and he knew that slowly lowering the output of the thrusts would remedy this situation, he was not very experienced in this field of flight. By bending his body in the wrong way along with his feet, he started rearing off to one side.

“Oh shit… I can’t balance it out!”

The two thrusters on the boots filled out the sky as they started propelling him all over the place. Even his attempt at stabilizing himself with the help of his hands which were also capable of discharging flames, failed. His armored body flew to the side and into the trees in the nearby forest where he had his first crash landing. Only thanks to an emergency mana shield and his newly attained body enhancements was he able to come out with only a few bruises.

Yet as he lay there in a crater of his own creation his mind drifted towards a solution to this dilemma. It seemed that retaining balance in the air wasn’t that easy and would probably become even harder the more complex magics he utilized. However, there was someone that seemed to do fine when casting the levitation spell and was quite competent in using it while chasing Roland down in the dungeon.

‘I wonder… could it be possible?’