As Falk went to talk to Ceselee, the group he’d been asked to work with began to approach them, making Thera shrink into her seat as they did, but before he could ask what was wrong they were called out to by the friendly voice of the skeleton slime.

“Hey there, fancy meeting you again! Glad to see you managed to survive!”

It was clear he was being spoken to, but he had no clue what they were talking about. Aside from the speaker who appeared to be a mage, the other three were a female hobgoblin wielding a large battle ax, a cat-sìth with a mace, and what looked like a frogman with a bow strapped to his back. Ben had long grown used to the large variety of unusual races and mixed-breed groups to exist in the world, but he would have thought a party looking like that would have stood out to him more, especially as he looked at their weapons.

How the hell do they even function as adventurers with stuff that low quality? He couldn’t help but think. Except for the bow, I could have made the staff at my first crafting level easily, not to mention the fact that the ax head and mace both look like they were made with molds instead of being properly forged. Are we going to be okay working with them?

He couldn’t help but worry and turned to Thera, who was doing her best to give an awkward greeting.

“Um, hello again. I didn’t get the chance to say it last time, but I’m so sorry about everything that happened.”

“Ah, don’t worry about it, we probably would have done the same in your shoes,” The hobgoblin told her cheerfully. “Just glad we could help. Anyway, I’m Uzi since we haven’t been properly introduced, this here is Zite, Nobu, and Eg,” She said, talking about the slime-person, the cat-sìth, and the frogman respectively. “Look forward to working with you.”

“Likewise,” Thera told them, still not seeming comfortable and leaving Ben to subtly try and figure out just what was the issue.

“Um, so how do you all know each other anyway?” He asked as cheerfully as he could. The atmosphere didn’t make it seem like they’d harassed her in the past, but that left him nothing to work with as the frogman Eg croaked out a small laugh.

“I guess you wouldn’t remember at all given the shape you were in at the time. It must have been what, a year and some ago we helped drag your corpse back to town.”

“Clearly not a corpse since he’s here before us,” Zite said. “Though we are happy to see you doing well. Once our minds cleared we had to leave town since we usually cover ensuring the roads are safe. It’s lucky you caught us while we were off.”

That little bit of extra information made it all click in his head. Despite the far too common occurrence that was him almost dying, there was only one time a group he didn’t know had helped. Back when he had been attacked by Roan’s alseer, Thera had used her charm to make a group of nearby adventurers help drag him back and saved his life, and it looked like he was now standing in front of them.

He’d never been able to thank them after, when talking to the guild it seemed that they were a group that constantly split their time between Stonewall and all of the towns towards the gate to ensure the woods were safe, meaning that they never stuck in one place long and after enough time passed the fact had slowly drifted from his mind. Now that they were all in front of him though he was quick to make that right.

“Oh, thanks so much for the save back then, I really appreciate it,” Thera’s awkwardness instantly made a lot more sense given that she’d charmed them all when she got them to help, but they seemed to brush it off easily enough.

“Don’t worry about it,” Uzi told him. “Adventurers need to look out for each other after all. For now, let's focus on the emergency quest. Is this the first one for both of you?” They gave a nod and she went on. “Thought so. The reason Ceselee paired us up like this was so you could join our party for the time being, it’s a good way to gain job experience. Zite, you mind?”

He gave a nod and without a word a notification popped up in Ben’s head.

“Um yes?” He said as the unfamiliar system prompt rang out in his head, while Thera gave a far more confident agreement.

He wasn’t completely sure about what change took place, but something felt subtly different within him as he agreed. It wasn’t like when he connected to someone, but it created a feeling of being joined to something else he couldn’t quite put into words.

“Excellent,” Uzi continued. “While we’ll be working with everyone in the guild, the point of creating groups like this is to watch each other's back when it gets time to actually fight and use the chance to grow together. So long as we all work together and keep each other safe then that's what matters.”

“Um, I’m not sure how much help I’ll actually be with any of that,” Ben awkwardly said. “I’m not a fighter at all, I’m actually just a craftsman.”

“So do you rely on magic then?”

“Nope, no magic skills. Well, I have enchanting but it doesn’t really do much in the middle of a fight.”

“You made it to rank four without any combat skills?” the hobgoblin asked with a raise of her eyebrows.

“Technically I have a couple at the zeroth level, but they’re only to help with my tool handling for crafting, they aren’t really any good in a fight. Sorry but I’m probably not going to be much help during all of this.”

“You wouldn’t have been able to climb the ranks if you couldn’t help so don’t worry about it, worst to worst you’ll be able to grab some free experience. Anyway, I’m sure you can already see, but our team is made up of an ax user, a mace user, bow user, as well as our goopy mage over there who has both light and fire magic. If you’re mainly a craftsman then mind if I ask about you?” She questioned Thera.

“Um, no not at all. I’m a mage as I’m sure you can tell. I mostly use earth and life magic, though I have access to telekinesis and dark magic as well. I prefer to avoid using dark magic if it can be helped though, it takes a while for me to use and can have some negative consequences for me if I do too much.”

“In that case, no need to worry about it,” She told her. “It’s just nice to have such a versatile mage around if we need it, between you and Zite we have pretty good coverage.”

“Hey, so on a slightly different note, mind if I ask about your weapons?” Ben questioned, no longer able to contain his curiosity. “No offense or anything, but they’re, well except for the bow… they’re complete garbage.”

He didn’t want to be rude, but he also couldn’t beat around the bush when he saw them. The fact that the lot of them had made it to rank four using tools like that was a wonder in itself.

It was Eg who broke into his croaking laughter as the rest of his party mumbled at the question. “Ha, you don’t mince words huh? Sad to say, my dear teammates have an issue that keeps them from getting anything but the cheapest of weapons.”

“Oh crap sorry, I didn’t really think about it when I spoke, of course you guys have personal issues if you’re using stuff like that,” He said, bowing his head and quickly apologizing. There were all sorts of reasons people would be low on funds in the world, but it only made Eg laugh louder.

“You’re not wrong, but unlike any of the very good reasons somebody could use, these bunch are a bunch of gambling addicts. Any money they make gets lost on dice or whatever catches their fancy quick, so no need to apologize to them. If anything, shame them more.”

His guilt vanished in an instant and turned into a long sigh instead as he pinched the bridge of his nose. If they gambled away too much of their money to be able to afford proper weapons then that was none of his business, but they had helped save his life in the past and they’d be working together for their emergency quest. It was in his best interest for them to have better quality items.

“Okay, I’ve decided. You lot come with me to the shop, I’m going to make you some proper tools to use.”

After a bit more discussion on the matter, namely the fact that he wouldn’t be charging them, they all happily followed him back, willing to accept the items as a late thanks for saving his life.

Luckily for him, they were all willing enough to share the skills they possessed with him so he could design the enchantment he would put on them to the best of his abilities before he got to work on putting everything together.

To begin with he started on the staff for Zite as the other metals he’d be using were heated up. Given the hundreds he’d made for Thera by that point, it was easy enough to make one quickly after selecting the metals to use and adding the most appropriate monster materials to enhance it with, it was done before he knew it and he put it to the side.

From there things got slightly more interesting for him and he moved on to creating something for the bowman Eg. from what he could see, he had the only weapon that didn’t need to be replaced with something that would actually be functional, but he also couldn’t just make him nothing. He’d helped save his life as much as the rest of them, so why should he be punished for being the only one with a bit of responsibility?

Rather than remake his bow though, he made a quiver instead, making sure to tie in a space affinity enchantment to let it hold significantly more arrows than a normal one ever would be able to. Without having added any magic materials to it, it would need to have mana supplied to it regularly, but that was a minor issue of upkeep. He also thought about adding enchantments to any arrows he had with him, but decided it could wait. There was really no rush to it after all, it was something he could do on the ride there to pass the time.

That just left the weapons. Working in the shop, he had plenty of experience making both battle axes and maces, but he didn’t want to just make the usual, he wanted to create something better.

Starting with the mace, he made it as he normally would, creating a sturdy metal pole with a large round head at the top, violent spikes protruding from it to give a threatening aura before leaving it there. The improvements would come from the enchantments, but there was still the ax to make as well.

That he needed to give some structural changes as he constructed it to let it fully utilize the enchantments he had in mind for it so he got to work, shaping the blade and sharpening it to the point that he was sure any creatures in the woods would be easily taken down by it while the back end was flattened; three deep tunnels carved into it to make use of a property he wanted it to have later.

Once he was happy with it he got to work shaping the enchantments, adding a variety to strengthen it as he normally would while at the same time using the blood thinning skill he got from Mercy, as well as a few others he thought could enhance it to the blade. Once that was done he focused on the tunnels in the back he’d created, making an enchantment with both fire and air spells to create small explosions within while at the same time tying in a time spell to speed up their effects. The idea was that once activated, it would create a significant amount of force that would instantly add more penetrating power to whatever it was digging into, with the only drawback being that since he didn’t add any magic materials to it, it would need to be loaded with mana ahead of time and it would be hard to recharge during a fight if the wielder didn’t have a large mana pool. Still, even one use could be enough to turn the tides of a battle and he hoped it would work out how he envisioned as he put it to the side to focus on the mace.

Even without any enchantments, it was leagues above what Nobu had been using, but he had an idea he was excited to test out. He placed all of his usual enchantments to strengthen the item, but on top of that he added one more, a barrier enchantment unlike any he’d done before.

Now that he could enchant with it at the sixth level, the amount he could do with it had greatly increased. Barriers could be made almost invisible, but since that would raise the cost and lower the performance he didn't bother with that at all, instead focusing on something completely different. How he shaped the barrier.

Covering the mace head, he made it so that once activated, spikes of mana would extend from those already present on the mace. They wouldn’t become long enough to hit the wielder, but especially if it activated at the same time as the point of contact, it could do a significant amount of damage. Combined with the other enchantments he blended into it, the mana cost wasn’t low. The only reason he was comfortable making it for the weapon was that the cat-sìth’s mana was naturally high, meaning they’d be able to get multiple uses out of it without issue.

Once done he looked down at all he created, feeling proud of his work but decided to add one last thing to each of them, more complicated than any of the others and something he’d only be able to do thanks to his reading in Anailia. One by one he added the final enchantments before handing each over and explaining what they’d do in detail.

As the party of four’s eyes gleamed they began testing them out, seeming thrilled with the result as they swung them around and were quick to give their thanks, happily taking the items.

“Still, stuff this good is going to be worth a pretty penny,” Uzi said with a laugh. “We’ll have to make sure not to gamble them away.”

“Oh it would be illegal if you did,” Ben said, confusing them as he laughed back. “That would be distributing cursed items.”

“Um, what?” Zite said as the cheer instantly died away, leaving Ben to explain himself.

“They’ve all got a curse enchanted to them of the death and dark affinities. If anyone but you all bother to use them they’ll suffer from pain and illness, just try holding each others if you don’t believe it,” He explained, watching them hand each over briefly before handing them back upon feeling the effects. “Not that I think any of you would consider selling them for gambling money or something, these are anti-theft measures of course.”

“Oh, uh yeah of course,” The skeleton slime said as the rest of his party looked to one another, wondering just what sort of person they’d been told to party with.