Ou Yangming’s Military Fire suddenly burned intensely on his hand. Its bright light caused the living beings around—even the Six-armed Giant Beast—to squint their eyes.
The giant beast was astonished. It was worth noting that it had the supreme bloodline, and it was considered a powerhouse even among many spirit beasts on the 10,000 Beasts Ridge.
Nonetheless, such a powerhouse could not look straight at the fire released by a human blacksmith. It was a completely unacceptable thing for it.
In actuality, if the giant beast squinted its eyes to observe the smithing process carefully, it would not be harmed at all. However, it was proud and unwilling to admit defeat, hence its eyes were as bright as legendary luminous pearls as it wanted to compete with the peculiar Military Fire.
Ou Yangming did not sense the giant beast’s intention. He carefully smithed and controlled his speed while also controlling the equipment’s quality.
Apart from the breathtaking and stirring magic tool at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five at the beginning, Ou Yangming did not smith anything else with the same equivalent rank.
Even so, none of the spirit beasts were suspicious of him at all because they witnessed him smith pieces of equipment after receiving Lin Feifeng’s guidance. Although Lin Feifeng admitted that Ou Yangming was superior to him, they would not be convinced about the young blacksmith being able to smith pieces of equipment at the peak of Rank Five as he wished.
Sure enough, after seeing that Ou Yangming only smithed pieces of Rank Three equipment in a row, the spirit beasts at the back of the link lost confidence in him. As such, they switched to join the line in front of Lin Feifeng.
Lin Feifeng seemed to be inferior to Ou Yangming indeed. Within the same period, not only was he slightly slower, but he also mostly smithed magic tools of Common Grade Rank Two. Even though he occasionally smithed Rank Three Ones but all in all, there were very few of them.
Nevertheless, there was a 2-times difference between the smithing rewards for them.
It was a difference that could not be ignored by any of the spirit beasts.
“Woosh…”
Ou Yangming shook his wrist and curbed his Military Fire.
He was careful when he smithed but while other blacksmiths did it to increase the qualities of pieces of equipment, he did it to lower their qualities intentionally.
When Ou Yangming smithed together with Lin Feifeng, he realized that he was too fast. If he went all-out, he would have finished 3 to 4 pieces of equipment before Lin Feifeng could even complete one. Furthermore, after the young fellow grasped the basic knowledge and became more familiar with the technique, the chances of him producing magic tools of Common Grade Rank Four or Rank Five became higher. Once he incorporated the integration of Heaven and man into smithing art, even if he slowed down and seemed to be smithing unusually, the pieces of equipment were all magic tools at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five.
Needless to say, he could not present the pieces of equipment. Therefore, whenever he was done smithing, he would use his Military Fire to draw 1 or 2 points of attributes to lower their equivalent ranks to Rank Three.
Rank Three was the bottom line that Ou Yangming had set for himself. After all, it would be too embarrassing if he could not smith magic tools of Common Grade Rank Three after having grasped the basic knowledge.
Despite having slowed down and lowered the tools’ qualities, he was still superior to Lin Feifeng.
Having said that, the mere difference did not make the spirit beasts willing to present twice the rewards they had prepared. As time passed, the number of spirit beasts in both lines became similar.
“Master, may I ask what…” A rather small spirit beast asked Ou Yangming softly.
Ou Yangming grinned and answered, “You’re lucky this time; I smithed a magic tool of Common Grade Rank Four. It’s yours.”
“Rank Four?” The spirit beast’s eyes lit up, and it thanked the young fellow with respect, “Thank you, master.”
It was not a tool at the peak of Rank Five, but it was content with the Rank Four equipment.
For 3 whole days, Ou Yangming and Lin Feifeng sat on the high platform. Other than having meals and taking breaks, they spent almost all of their time smithing pieces of equipment for the spirit beasts.
In the beginning, Ou Yangming deliberately slowed down as he paid attention to Lin Feifeng’s progress. When he eventually realized a bigger difference between the lines in front of them, he immediately cast his worries aside and sped up.
However, it would cost much more to get him to smith pieces of equipment, thus many spirit beasts could not request his help.
Ou Yangming was done smithing after 3 days, but Lin Feifeng was still smithing leisurely.
He patted his clothes while he waited for Lin Feifeng to take a break, then he chuckled and said, “Brother Ou, thanks for your pointers. I’ll go take a look at the other places.”
Lin Feifeng nodded and smiled. “You should, but would you like to join me again after the Trading Meet ends?”
Ou Yangming laughed and replied to him, “I couldn’t have asked for more.”
He initially wanted the Silver Ridge Giant Leopard to lead him out of the 10,000 Beasts Ridge, but it seemed like he no longer needed the company of the unlucky leopard.
With the 10,000 Beasts Venerable One’s order and his relationship with Multi-armed King Kong, he was certain that nobody would be so idiotic as to attack him.
That said, just as he was about to leave, a figure hurried over from the mountain top.
It was a humongous spirit bear. The moment it arrived, the spirit beasts around the high platform backed away as they feared and were wary of it.
At one glance, Ou Yangming could tell that the unexpected spirit beast was not only more enormous, but it also carried a more fearsome aura.
Lin Feifeng’s face changed as he warned Ou Yangming, “Brother Ou, be careful. This is a middle-grade spirit beast, so we can’t offend it.”
While he could smith magic tools, his cultivation base was only equivalent to a mortal’s Extreme Grade, so he was appalled under the middle-grade spirit beast’s pressure.
On the contrary, Ou Yangming did not feel anything abnormal in front of the spirit beast because he had encountered plenty of powerhouses before. Not to mention a middle-grade spirit beast, even if it was a top-grade spirit beast, what could it do? Could it be compared with the Ghost-clawed Venerable One or the 10,000 Beasts Venerable One?
Even if it was a Venerable One, could it be a match for the appearances of the dragon and the phoenix?
Ou Yangming had seen the dragon and the phoenix, so the little middle-grade spirit beast was not a big deal to him.
The spirit bear questioned in a hoarse voice, “I heard someone here smithed a magic tool at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five. Who was it?” It scanned Ou Yangming and Lin Feifeng with its sharp eyes.
Ou Yangming looked in the direction where the Six-armed Giant Beast was before but unfortunately, it had left, or the middle-grade spirit beast would not have dared to be so overbearing.
He stepped in front of Lin Feifeng and answered, “It was me. May I know the reason you’re here?”
The spirit bear’s eyes gleamed, and it laughed out loud. “Oh, it’s another newcomer. Which sect is your inheritance from?”
“None of the sects,” Ou Yangming answered.
“That’s impossible. A blacksmith without a sect’s inheritance can’t smith a magic tool at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five.” The spirit bear was surprised.
Ou Yangming looked strangely at Lin Feifeng, who shook his head and noted, “Your Excellency, you’re mistaken. There have been cases where rogue blacksmiths without any sect’s inheritance managed to smith magic tools at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five.” He added after a short pause, “Perhaps it never happened during the Trading Meets, but it’s not unprecedented.”
The spirit bear widened its eyes and released an intense pressure, but it quickly restrained itself and scoffed. “Fine. Even if one can smith magic tools at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five, one can’t smith magic tools of Good Grade and above, right?”
Lin Feifeng hesitated for a moment before he answered with a bitter smile, “I have no idea.”
It was true that books about equipment smithing were sold in bookstores in the Humans’ boundary, but they only included content about Common Grade magic tools. As for magic tools of Good Grade and above, one could only learn about them through inheritances.
In actual fact, Lin Feifeng’s inheritance must not be underestimated but according to his qualification, he had a long way to go before he could arrive at that boundary.
As for when he could make attempts, it was out of his control.
“Alright, this will be a pointless debate if we go on.” Ou Yangming nodded and stared at the spirit bear as he asked, “Why did you come here, Your Excellency?”
At this point, he understood that spirit beasts of different grades had dissimilar requests for their pieces of equipment. Given that the middle-grade spirit beast ran over here instead of waiting at the peak, it must have a request to make.
Sure enough, the spirit bear hesitated for a while before it asked, “Can you smith Good Grade magic tools?”
Ou Yangming was dumbfounded. He laughed and replied to the beast with another question, “Didn’t you say that one that learned smithing art without an inheritance won’t be able to achieve that?”
The spirit bear scratched its head as it was distressed. “Ah, even if it’s not of Good Grade, it’s acceptable if it’s at the peak of Common Grade.”
Middle-grade spirit beasts were much more formidable than low-grade spirit beasts, but very few could acquire a full set of Good Grade magic tools. Nonetheless, they disdained Common Grade magic tools, such that they only collected those that were at the peak of Common Grade or had unique attributes.
“I’m sorry, but I’ll have to disappoint you, Your Excellency,” Ou Yangming responded with a smile. He shook his head and explained, “I did smith a magic tool at the peak of Common Grade Rank Five by chance, but I can’t achieve that standard every time. They can testify for me.” He pointed at the remaining spirit beasts below the platform.
The spirit bear was disheartened when it turned to look.
It shook its head and sighed, then it flashed and dashed back to the mountain peak as though it was the wind.
Ou Yangming secretly found it funny. Not to mention if he could actually smith higher-leveled tools, even if he could, this would not be the right place and time to expose it.
If not, what would Lin Feifeng think? What would the spirit beasts that paid twice the price for a piece of equipment think?
The young fellow shook his head and bid Lin Feifeng his farewell. Following that, he headed to the mountain top with Big Yellow, Far Antelope, and the Silver Ridge Giant Leopard.
‘More brilliant smithing techniques must be waiting for me over there.’