I ignored her for now though, and turned my attention to the Dwarf and the young man approaching me.
"Yer back, lass," Gennady said, holding up a mug of beer. He burped loudly, before wiping the foam off his beard. "Glad to see ya fine." He tried to reach in for a hug, but I pushed him back.
"You smell." I pressed my mask against my face to ease the stench, and spoke in a muffled voice. "How much have you been drinking?"
"Far too much," Sevin piped up from beside him. "I’ve been trying to get Master Gennady to stop, but he doesn’t listen."
"Oh come on, this ain’t half as much as what I can drink." The Dwarf smacked me across the back. He took a large gulp from the mug, before lowering it and grinning. "And we're celebrating! Sevin has just made his first original mana tool! He’s been working on it for weeks now, y’know? So come on, drink!"
He tried offering it to Sevin who politely declined, before turning to me and stopping himself as I indicated at my mask.
"Fine, if no one wants it, more for me!"
Gennady downed the last of his beer, as I looked over at Sevin.
"You’re finished with your pistol?" I asked, cocking my head.
He nodded excitedly. "Yes— although it’s not just a pistol. I designed it so you can fire two kinds of bolts. The first is nonlethal. It’s supposed to stun you. The second fires mana bullets. It’s slightly stronger than regular ones, but nothing too impressive. It probably pierces as well as or slightly better than a crossbow bolt."
"That’s… amazing!" I said, staring at the young man.
I felt rather embarrassed about not having produced anything notable just yet. Sure, Sevin had been tinkering for far longer than me, but I should have been able to make more than just a simple lighter— which was my greatest creation so far.
And yet, I still felt a flush of pride for his achievement. Because it was an achievement. He had made something he could call his own, and that was something to be praised.
Sevin eagerly reached for his belt. "It really is! Although some people"— he glanced over at the drunk Gennady— "think it’s mediocre."
"And that’s because it is," the Dwarf said simply. I glared at him as Sevin sighed, but he just shrugged. "Listen lad, I think it’s good that you’ve made your own mana tool, but it’s nothing groundbreaking. Maybe if you designed it so you can just flip a switch to alternate between lethal and nonlethal, I’d say it’s good. But the fact that you have to manually change mana crystals to do that makes it too inefficient for me to say it’s anything beyond ‘alright’."
"Manually switch mana crystals?" I looked between the two in confusion.
Sevin shuffled his feet uncomfortably. "You have to, uh, swap out mana crystals to use the different types of bolts." He held up the pistol, and gestured at the small recess where the mana crystal was supposed to go. "If you put an Inferior mana crystal here, the pistol will shoot out stunning bolts. But if you put a Lesser mana crystal in there, it will fire a regular bolt."
"Wait, you can do that?" I frowned.
"‘Course," Gennady snorted. "Why wouldn’t you be able to do that? A Lesser mana crystal would be able to provide more mana for the bolt, making it more deadly since that’s how this gun in specific is designed."
"And that works too if you put a Superior mana crystal in it?"
"I wouldn’t do that, but you can. It’d be a waste of a Superior mana crystal. As far as this pistol goes, the power of the bolts increase at a decreasing rate. It’d be more deadly, sure, but it wouldn’t be worth it."
Sevin scratched the back of his head as he added, "Yeah, it isn’t too… good. But it’s something I made, at least." I pursed my lips as I noticed his face fall a little bit.
I reached for the pistol, and he let me take it. I inspected it for a moment, before turning back to him. "I think it’s great," I said. "And ignore Gennady, he’s drunk so he’s being more insensitive than usual."
"Huh? I’m not drunk!" the Dwarf sputtered, but I ignored him.
"So I can just use any Lesser or Inferior mana crystal, and it works?"
"No," Sevin said. He fumbled for his belt pouched, holding out a handful of shards of mana crystals. "You have to use these ones. If they run out, I’ll have to make more. But it only works because the runes on the mana crystals connect with the runs in the hole here, see?"
I carefully listened to the young man as he explained. When he was finished, I looked back up to him and nodded.
"Alright. I’ll buy this from you?"
"You— what?"
He stared at me in shock, but I just reassured him.
"Look, I was thinking about this earlier today. I need a way to fight in a way that doesn’t kill someone. And this gun’s stun bolts are perfect for me."
"No— but…" he protested. I simply waved a hand nonchalantly.
"Whatever price you name, I’ll pay for it. And I’ll pay for the mana crystals as well."
Sevin slowly worked his mouth. "Err… maybe 10— 12 gold?"
"Done," I said, grabbing a handful of gold coins and handing it to him. I was not sure if that was a good price— in fact, I felt like that was rather cheap. However, whether or not he was ripping himself off was none of my concern; he named his price, and I paid for it.
I held up the gun, aiming it in the direction of the rock wall and firing a
