With Klaus and Emma's end of year wishes made a little earlier than usual, the new year would come even faster for them and new cycles would begin for both of them.
After Christmas, Klaus used the few remaining days of the year to take care of what needed to be taken care of. He went to the bank and the hospital where Rhyzer was admitted, talked to those he needed to talk to, and paid off his family's debts.
His account was obviously practically empty again, but at least now everything was settled, and since he had already paid the monthly fees for the next few months, he decided to keep Rhyzer Park in the Hospital Vida Feliz until he found a place that was just as good, only better priced.
As the agreement with the bank stated, the Park's house on Long Island was returned to Chun and Michael's names, and they were able to return home after almost a whole month of living in a single room.
Klaus also returned to his parents' home, at least for a while, but before doing so, he talked straight to Jayaa and thanked him immensely with a tight hug.
Jayaa was an emotional man and obviously cried at the goodbye, but Klaus reassured him and reiterated that this was not goodbye. They could still go out drinking sometimes and do missions together within Rise Online whenever Jayaa wanted. Furthermore, Klaus reminded him that he owed Jayaa a lot for agreeing to fight Taznaar. This made Jayaa cry even more than before.
On the same day that he was removing his few things from the apartment, Klaus saw Emma for the first time one morning.
She woke up early to say goodbye to him as well.
As a thank you, as she was leaving Klaus also gave her a tight hug and said that what he said to Jayaa was also true for her, so Emma could call him to hunt or do quests in RO, as well as call him for drinks.
Emma smiled at his words and stated:
"Of course we will do that. After all, you promised that you would teach me the trick to defeat the Centaur Druid. However, that will have to wait for a while. I have a lot of work to do this early in the year."
Obediently, Klaus nodded and replied that all she needed to do was call him if she needed anything. Then he nodded, momentarily saying goodbye to the two brothers of different hair colors, but equally teary-eyed blue eyes.
When he got home, Klaus used an entire day off from Rise Online to help Michael and Chun. Since the house had been empty for almost a month, there was a lot of work to be done.
The whole house was dusty and cold inside. Even the engine room was freezing.
Little by little the furniture in the rented shed was brought back and many things had to be reassembled, not to mention also the large amount of snow that had accumulated in the front yard and had to be cleared. Despite all this, by the end of the 27th the house was as it was before on the outside, and inside there were still a few things missing to make it exactly as it was before, but this would be solved in time.
As soon as Klaus entered Rise Online again the next day, he had a huge surprise. His store was empty, and Og'tharoz was leaning over the counter with his tongue out and a dead look on his face.
"What the hell happened here?" Kaizen inquired, raising his hands, as he entered the store.
The swords in the display cases had disappeared, as well as the armor on the stands and various other items that were scattered on shelves and barrels.
Og'tharoz raised his head upon hearing the co-owner's voice and flew over to Kaizen with an angry look on his face. In an ancient demonic language, Og'tharoz asked:
"Otidlam, evetse edno roP? oculam átse êcov?"
Kaizen widened his eyes upon hearing this, and then laughed. "What the fuck was that? Say something I can understand."
Then the demon calmed down and explained everything that had happened.
Apparently, rumors about a new equipment store in the Commercial District having entered into a partnership with King Spelloyal had spread, and this leveraged the fame of the Crow Leg Equipment Store to an unexpected level. Customers didn't stop showing up for two whole days, and it only got worse when everyone realized that the fame the store achieved was not unworthy. The items in that store were really spectacular.
However, customers continued to show up a few times a day even when the stock ran out, and Og'tharoz, exhausted, had to continue serving them and dealing with his fear of talking to humans.
Kaizen laughed at the demon when he finished telling them everything, but thanked him for all his hard work and said he owed the demon a favor now.
Og'tharoz himself noticed at this point how different Kaizen's mood was from before and asked if something had happened to make him disappear for so long.
Since he could not tell the demon about real life, Kaizen told him that he was just making sure that his troubles were over.
Og'tharoz had to be satisfied with this answer.
So on the first day back at Rise Online, the first thing Kaizen planned to do was to fulfill the demand contract he had signed with the King. Then he could deal with the lack of stock in his own store.
Luckily, the King was one step ahead, and all the raw materials he would need to make the 50 suits of armor had already been delivered, as well as a letter of some details the King would like to see in the armor.
So Kaizen used the whole end of the year, which was usually tedious, to have fun making as much armor as he could per day.
For days on end he hammered out various sheets of metal, melted and contorted gold, did countless temperings, and learned new forging techniques.
Kaizen hardly left his forge for three days in a row, and when he finally finished the fiftieth set of armor, he finally evolved his Profession Level after so long, officially going from being an Apprentice Blacksmith to becoming a legitimate Intermediate Blacksmith.
If the people of the world knew that he was only an Intermediate Blacksmith making Epic Rank items like it was nothing, it would probably shake the entire webnet.
Speaking of which, not only did the rumor about King Spelloyal's new blacksmith spread, but also the truth about what Kaizen did that day in the Royal Palace came to light through an official statement from the King.
In the communiqué spread throughout the nation, Steveren confirmed that the noblewoman Niah Waylan, his ex-wife, attempted a coup d'état with the support of the famous adventurer's guild called the Desert Lions and with the support of a man named Thenomor. Except for Niah, all the other coup plotters remained at large, and the King stated that those who knew information about their whereabouts would be generously rewarded if the information proved true.
Even during Christmas, the nickname Kaizen was once again cheered as Hero of Tretidian by some users.
Kaizen laughed at this when he read the newspaper article, but he didn't care much either as he had a lot of work to do even after finishing the King's quest. After all, the stock in his weapon store was not going to fill up on its own.
However, even as Kaizen kept the 'Closed' sign facing forward on the door of his store, someone entered. A tall man with a bushy beard, dirty looks and dark glasses, whose heavy footsteps made the wooden floor creak and his yellowish smile somehow made it clear that he was not someone of much company.
...
Edited by: DrHitsuji
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