402: Chapter 402 He hadn't even warmed up the hammer yet

Chen You walked toward his next target.

This was an extremely burly dwarf, swinging a giant hammer even larger than himself, panting heavily.

"What is the most painful thing about blacksmithing?" the burly dwarf asked between gasps.

Chen You looked at his sweat-drenched appearance and answered sincerely, "Not having the money to buy good blueprints."

"Wrong!" the burly dwarf roared. "It's the boredom! It's the loneliness of facing the furnace day after day! Can you endure such loneliness?"

Chen You rubbed his chin. "What if I spend some money to hire a few top-tier girls to dance and cheer for you on the side?"

The burly dwarf was stunned.

The giant hammer he held mid-air froze for a full five seconds.

"This... this is against the rules." The burly dwarf's old face flushed red, and his eyes began to wander.

"A forging sanctuary cannot accommodate women of the night... but if they are top-tier... it's not entirely impossible."

"It would at least increase hammer-swinging efficiency by two hundred percent. You have great ideas; I acknowledge you."

Progress: 2/10.

Bronzebeard covered his face in the background.

Chen You continued forward.

The third dwarf, skinny and bony, was staring blankly at a piece of rare metal glowing with purple light.

"When you encounter an indestructible material that your hammer cannot break and the furnace cannot melt, what should you do?" the thin dwarf asked with a stubborn gaze.

"Smash it with money," Chen You said decisively.

The thin dwarf sneered. "How vulgar! Can gold coins smash Adamantite?"

Chen You raised a finger. "I'll offer a hundred thousand gold coins to hire a hundred Master-level Blacksmiths from across the server. One hammer blow each, taking turns smashing it."

"If it doesn't break, I'll add another hundred thousand."

The thin dwarf's sneer froze on his face.

He imagined that spectacular scene: a hundred Masters swinging giant hammers. Forget Adamantite; even a city wall could be smashed down.

"...Strength in numbers, that's logical and well-founded."

"Acknowledged."

Progress: 3/10.

The fourth dwarf was a one-eyed man.

"If the weapon forged is a failure, with trash stats that nobody wants, how do you handle it?" the one-eyed dwarf asked.

"Pack it in an exquisite mystery box," Chen You brought out modern business logic. "Label it as a 'Mysterious Ancient Relic' and sell it to those fated individuals who love to gamble on their luck."

"Even trash can be sold at the price of a divine artifact."

The one-eyed dwarf gasped, as if a door to a new world had opened. "Profiteer! But... it's profitable."

"Acknowledged!"

The fifth dwarf...

The sixth dwarf...

The atmosphere in the hall completely changed.

The once solemn forging sanctuary had turned into Chen You's business roadshow.

Using pure capitalist thinking and the dimensionality reduction strike of a super tycoon, he bamboozled these NPCs, who had been working behind closed doors for years, until they were dazed.

Bronzebeard followed behind, his expression shifting from anger and shock to gradual numbness.

He realized that Chen You was exploitatively bugging the system's judgment logic; as long as Chen You's answer could logically 'solve' the dilemma posed by the dwarves, the system would judge it as an 'acknowledgment.'

Even if the solution reeked of money.

In less than ten minutes, Chen You had already obtained nine acknowledgments.

Progress: 9/10.

He walked toward the last dwarf in the corner of the hall.

This dwarf was different from the others.

He wasn't blacksmithing or lighting a fire; he just sat quietly on a discarded anvil, holding a small, rusty iron hammer.

Most importantly, his eyes were covered by a tattered cloth.

He was blind.

The Blind Dwarf heard footsteps and slowly turned his head.

"The smell of gold coins on you is too strong," the Blind Dwarf said in a raspy voice.

"The nine fools before me had their eyes clouded by you, but I am blind, so I see very clearly."

Chen You raised an eyebrow.

Oh, he'd run into a tough nut to crack.

"Money cannot buy true skill." The Blind Dwarf held up the rusty hammer. "I will ask you one last question."

"What is the ultimate hammer technique?"

Chen You fell silent.

This question was a bit abstract.

Smashing it with money wouldn't work, and the mystery box theory didn't fit either.

He turned to look at Bronzebeard nearby.

Bronzebeard crossed his arms, wearing an 'I'll see how you pass this stage' expression.

Chen You retracted his gaze, and what Bronzebeard had said before flashed through his mind.

"Xiaji Eight Hammers..."

Chen You sighed and looked at the Blind Dwarf, his tone unusually calm. "The ultimate hammer technique is not being constrained by rules, nor being hindered by sight."

The Blind Dwarf's hand tightened slightly on the hammer.

Chen You continued, "Close your eyes and just hammer blindly."

The hall instantly fell silent.

Bronzebeard's sneer froze on his face, and he almost spat out a mouthful of blood.

However, the Blind Dwarf's body began to tremble violently.

He stood up abruptly, and the rusty iron hammer in his hand fell to the ground with a clang.

Two lines of tears flowed from beneath the tattered cloth covering his eyes, tracing paths down his coal-ash-covered cheeks.

"The Great Way is simple... the Great Way is simple indeed!" The Blind Dwarf roared toward the heavens, his voice shrill yet filled with ecstasy.

"I have sat here for thirty years, racking my brain, yet I was not as good as you, who revealed the secret of heaven in a single sentence!"

"Exactly! Since I can't see, then I'll just hammer blindly! This is the highest realm of doing as one pleases!"

A beam of light ten times thicker than before shot up from the Blind Dwarf's head and slammed into Chen You's badge.

Progress: 10/10.

[System Notification: You have received the absolute acknowledgment of ten veteran blacksmiths.]

Chen You patted the Blind Dwarf's shoulder. "Brother, it's good that you've realized it. Don't get too excited."

He turned around and walked toward the petrified Bronzebeard, extending his hand.

"All ten are here. Where is my ultimate skill?"

Bronzebeard looked at Chen You as if he were a monster.

He never would have dreamed that the sacred and inviolable hidden trial would be cleared by this human in such an absurd and ridiculous manner.

The system's mandatory instructions flashed frantically in his mind, urging him to issue the reward.

Gritting his teeth, Bronzebeard reached into his robes with a trembling hand, pulled out an ancient book radiating seven-colored light, and slapped it into Chen You's hand.

"Take it! You... you mudslide of the forging world!"

The surrounding players' eyes instantly turned red with envy.

The players who had traveled all the way to stay in East Iron City were all, without exception, complete forging fanatics.

They endured the boring progress bars here, swinging their hammers thousands of times a day and losing health from the heat of the furnace. For what?

Wasn't it for stronger skills! Better blueprints!

Old Tie No Problem clutched his hair, his worldview shattered to pieces.

"Why?!" A bare-chested Berserker player broke down on the spot, his hammer slamming onto the ground.

"I've been forging pig iron here for three months and haven't gotten a damn thing! He hasn't even warmed up his hammer, yet he took the ultimate secret manual just by chatting?"

"Can this game even be played like this? He must be cheating!"

"Protest! I want to report this kind of balance-breaking behavior!"

Indignation boiled among the crowd.

The temperature in the hall seemed to rise a few degrees due to the players' jealousy.

Chen You turned a deaf ear to the surrounding protests.

With a faint smile on his lips, he reached out to take the ancient book radiating light from Grandmaster Bronzebeard.

"Hold it!"

A roar like thunder erupted from outside the hall.