Chương 978: Chapter 976: The Orbiting Arsenal

Seven specific weapons caught his eye among the hundreds of blunt instruments. He stopped in the very back corner of the grand hall and three towering warhammers stood upright in a heavy iron rack. They were almost as tall as he was and the heads of these warhammers were the size of the entire upper body of the elder standing nearby. The weapons were forged from dark steel and covered in jagged spikes meant to puncture hides before the weight crushed the bones underneath.

Li Yu approached them and ran his hand over the cold iron as he turned to the armory elder who was watching him.

"Elder." Li Yu spoke up and his voice echoed slightly in the hall.

"I will take these three warhammers. However, I do not need the handles. Is there a way to safely remove the iron heads from the shafts?" The armory elder blinked at the unsual request and stepped forward. He looked at the three weapons and then looked back at Li Yu.

"Remove the handles?" The elder asked with wide eyes.

"Boy, those shafts are carved from ancient Ironwood and wrapped in beast leather to prevent slipping. They are perfectly balanced for a heavy overhead strike."

"I understand." Li Yu replied with a polite nod.

"But the handle will only weigh down the weapon for the technique I am developing. I only need the spiked heads." Before the elder could formulate a response, Li Yu walked a few paces further down the aisle and he stopped in front of two incredibly heavy mauls. They looked like solid cubes of iron meant to shatter thick gates rather than strike living opponents.

"I will take these two mauls as well." Li Yu added while pointing at the blocky weapons.

"But once again, I do not want the handles attached." He took a few more steps and located two double sided great axes. Their thick heads were shaped like crescent moons.

"And these two axes." Li Yu finished his request.

"Remove the shafts for these as well, please." The armory elder crossed his thick arms over his broad chest and he stared at the seven weapons and then glared down at the young cultivator. He let out a deep sigh of frustration.

'What an unusual request. Did he hit his head against that Kraken? Or did he get these strange ideas from the Li Clan? Who buys a perfectly crafted weapon just to snap the handle off and throw away half of it?' The elder thought to himself.

"Li Yu." The elder said aloud.

"It is a complete waste for you to take these finished weapons. You are ruining weeks of careful craftsmanship just to harvest the iron chunks at the top. The materials in those grips are highly valuable."

"I apologize if it seems wasteful." Li Yu said with a small smile.

"But I truly only need the heavy iron portions. They do not need to be swung by hand." The elder rubbed his thick braided beard and shook his head.

"If you do not need to swing them, then do not butcher my inventory." The elder grunted at him.

"You should instead go directly to the blacksmiths in the forge district and place a custom order. If you just need a heavy block of metal to hit things with, have them forge you a solid spiked box or ball. Have them make it as durable and tough as the ore will allow. It will be cheaper and it will save my perfectly good weapons here for those that actually need them." Li Yu paused and considered the words. The logic of the armory elder was flawless.

Why buy a finished weapon when he could custom order the exact shape and weight he desired without paying for the premium woodwork and leather wrapping?

"That is a great idea." Li Yu agreed readily as he bowed toward the older man.

"Thank you for the guidance, Elder. I will head to the forge immediately."

"Go on then." The elder grunted while waving him away. He watched the young man leave the armory and muttered under his breath.

"A warrior asking for a weapon without a handle around here is bizarre. The youth these days have too much Qi and not enough sense it would seem." Li Yu simply smiled as he walked out the heavy iron doors. He navigated the winding stone paths of the estate and walked toward the primary forge district of the Zhan Clan. The ambient temperature rose steadily with every step he took. The air grew thick with the smell of burning coal and molten iron.

Towering stone chimneys belched thick black smoke high into the sky and the rhythmic sound of thousands of heavy hammers striking stone anvils echoed like a continuous thunderstorm rolling through a canyon. Rivers of glowing liquid metal flowed through carefully carved trenches in the stone ground. He arrived at the main entrance of the forge area and a group of heavily muscled disciples stood guard near the towering stone archway. Li Yu approached the closest guard as he got near.

"Excuse me." Li Yu stated politely.

"I need to commission a custom order. Who would be the best master smith for what I am looking for? I have a rather unusual request." The guard wiped his sweaty forehead with the back of his bracer and let out a loud laugh as he turned to his companion.

"Did you hear that?" The guard chuckled.

"He wants someone for an unusual request." The second guard laughed and pointed a thick finger deep into the sprawling district.

"You want to head all the way to the very back near the cliff face." The second guard advised.

"Look for Master Zhan Ku. He likes to handle the strange and unusual requests much more than the rest of the smiths here. He is a true master but he gets bored forging standard things all day."

"Thank you." Li Yu nodded. He followed their directions and walked past dozens of blazing furnaces. He navigated through the blistering heat until he reached a secluded workshop built directly into the side of a rocky cliff. The area outside the shop was cluttered with strange metal prototypes and heavy armor plates that looked like they belonged on demonic beasts. Tongs the size of grown men hung on the blackened stone walls. A broad shouldered man stood over an immense anvil in the center of the workshop.

His skin was completely stained with soot and his thick beard was tied back with a leather strap. The anvil itself looked like it was carved directly from a fallen meteorite and the smith was hammering a block of glowing steel with terrifying strength. This was Master Zhan Ku. Li Yu waited patiently near the entrance as he did not want to interrupt the man during his work. If something were to happen, he would be blamed for it.

Zhan Ku brought his heavy hammer down one final time and the steel rang out with a pure tone. The smith plunged the glowing metal into a trough of dark oil as a large cloud of smoke erupted into the air.

"State your business." Zhan Ku grunted without turning around. He wiped his hands on a heavy leather apron.

"If you want a standard weapon, go bother the apprentices in the front." If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"I was told you were the best man to see for an unusual request." Li Yu spoke up as he stepped fully into the workshop. Zhan Ku turned around upon hearing those words and he looked at Li Yu and recognized him from the banquet awhile back. He raised a thick eyebrow."'What exactly does a cultivator from the Li Clan need from a brute like me?" Master Ku asked him in a joking way.

"I need sixty weapons." Li Yu stated clearly as he stepped up to the anvil and met the gaze of the master smith.

"I want ten metal balls covered in thick spikes. Each spiked ball needs to be roughly one meter in diameter. I also want ten double sided great axes, measuring exactly one meter from edge side to edge side. Finally, I need ten javelins, also one meter in length." Zhan Ku crossed his arms and waited, those were not unusual requests.

"And?" Zhan Ku prompted.

"And I only care that they are as indestructible as possible." Li Yu finished.

"They do not need handles or grips. Just the heavy metal heads." Zhan Ku stared at him as the master smith reached up and rubbed his soot stained chin.

'No handles?' Zhan Ku thought with a frown.

'A spiked ball one meter across? That thing will weigh so much.'

"How exactly are you going to use these things?" Zhan Ku asked out loud. His voice carried genuine curiosity.

"You cannot swing a one meter ball of solid iron by hand without a chain."

"I am not going to swing them by hand." Li Yu explained calmly.

"I am going to use my Qi to orbit them around my body at high speeds. I want to create a fixed perimeter of flying weapons. The mental strain is minimal if they just stay on a set path." Zhan Ku opened his eyes in surprise as he looked the young man up and down. Cultivators who utilized weapon arts usually requested significantly smaller and lighter items. Flying needles or slender flying swords were the standard across the cosmos.

Smaller weapons meant a vastly lower drain on a cultivator's Qi reserves during a prolonged battle. To go that route with such large and heavy objects seemed foolish in terms of energy consumption.

"You insist on making them that large?" Zhan Ku warned him.

"Spinning large boulders around your body will drain your body dry."

"I have the capacity for it." Li Yu insisted firmly.

"I need the weight and stopping power to crush heavily armored beasts. I do not want them to bounce off thick shells." The smith thought about the request as he turned to his wooden drafting table covered in charcoal sketches. He picked up a piece of chalk and quickly drew a rough outline of a double sided great axe on a slab of slate.

"If you are just going to be hurling it through the air and spinning it, a double sided axe is a terrible idea." Zhan Ku pointed out while tapping the slate.

"If you want it to spin like a top, why not make it four sided?" Zhan Ku quickly sketched two more blades onto the drawing and it looked much more even and filled in now.

"That way it can slice its way through a chaotic battlefield much better. It will carry the spin naturally." Zhan Ku suggested.

"I like that." Li Yu nodded approvingly as it looked like it made perfect sense.

"Let us go with the four sided design instead of the axes."

"Good." Zhan Ku grunted.

"Now, regarding the edges. You said you want durability above all else. If you want these to be truly indestructible, we cannot give them a fine cutting edge. A sharp edge is thin and thin metal will inevitably chip when it strikes something tough." Zhan Ku tapped the edge of his anvil with his chalk to emphasize the point.

"We need to make the edges very thick. They must be deliberately blunted." The master smith explained.

"They will not slice smoothly like a fine sword. They will act as a blunt cutting tool. They will tear through flesh and shatter armor relying entirely on their immense weight, their rapid spin speed and the speed at which they are flying towards the target." Li Yu smiled at the man's words, brutal trauma was exactly what he was looking for.

"That sounds perfect." Li Yu agreed.

"Do exactly that." With the wise words of the master smith in mind regarding Qi drain, Li Yu realized he needed to plan for less optimal battle conditions. He would not always have access to an ocean of Qi on hand at all times.

"Since you brought up the energy drain, I would like to make an addition." Li Yu said.

"I want smaller versions of the arsenal as well. I need a quarter of a meter version of each weapon type for when I am lower in Qi or when I need to conserve my energy." Zhan Ku did the math in his head.

"So, you want ten large spiked balls, ten large four sided discs and ten large javelins." Zhan Ku calculated aloud.

"Plus ten smaller spiked balls, ten smaller four sided discs and ten smaller javelins. That brings the total up to sixty solid weapons."

"Yes." Li Yu confirmed.

"Can you do it?"

"Since you are just focusing on durability and ignoring complex arrays or spiritual intent, the forging process itself shouldn't be too bad." Zhan Ku answered honestly.

"But it will get extremely expensive. The amount of premium material I will need to melt down and forge for the large versions alone is staggering."

"I agree to pay whatever it costs." Li Yu assured him without hesitation. Zhan Ku waved a soot stained hand dismissively.

"I will total it up once I am completely done with the batch and let you know the final price." Zhan Ku stated.

"I am not worried about you skipping out on the bill. Your grandfather is Zhan Tian and your mother is Commander Tielan. I can always bother them if you run off." He said with a chuckle. The smith turned back to his glowing furnace.

"Come back in three days." Zhan Ku instructed over his shoulder.

"I will craft one prototype of each weapon type for you to check on. If you approve of the weight and the metal blend, I will create the rest."

"Thank you, Master Ku." Li Yu bowed slightly.

"I will see you in three days." He left the blazing heat of the forge district and took to the sky. He flew back to the quiet and peaceful shores of his Five Star Lakes to wait out the three days. The next three days passed quickly in a blur of highly focused routine. Li Yu dedicated his time entirely to cultivating and preparing for his new technique. He sat by the shimmering water of the deepest lake and continuously circulated his Qi.

The warm sun beat down on his skin while the gentle sound of aquatic beasts splashing in the water provided a serene background noise. He spent his evenings standing in the grassy clearing and practiced the intense mental focus required to establish a fixed perimeter of orbiting Qi. Li Yu visualized the heavy metal spheres and the bladed discs spinning rapidly around his body as he divided his attention into layered orbital tracks.

At other times Li Yu was trying to map out the optimal distances to avoid striking his own limbs while maximizing the lethal area of effect. The peaceful environment of the valley provided the perfect contrast to the brutal martial techniques he was currently developing. The morning of the fourth day arrived with a crisp breeze as Li Yu ended his meditation session and flew back to the main estate. He returned to the secluded workshop at the very back of the bustling forge area.

Master Zhan Ku was already waiting for him and drinking some wine. The smith stood near a reinforced stone table as six heavy objects rested on the scarred surface. There was one large spiked ball and one quarter meter spiked ball. There was one large blunted four bladed disc and one smaller version. There was a one meter long javelin and its smaller counterpart. Li Yu greeted Master Zhan Ku and then walked over to the table and immediately checked out the weapons.

He placed both hands on the large spiked ball and lifted it from the stone. The weight was immense but manageable. He set it down and ran his hand over the thick blunted edges of the disc. The metal was cold and unyielding to the touch. The javelins possessed no grips, they were just smooth spikes of destructive weight. He was incredibly happy with the quality of every single piece.

"I came up with a specific mix of different types of metals for them." Zhan Ku explained proudly while wiping his hands on his apron.

"I blended four different types of metals and alloys together, each known for its durability. They won't win any awards for their looks but they should be extremely tough."

"They are perfect." Li Yu stated firmly as he was touching them all over. He looked at the master smith with deep appreciation.

"I agree to have the rest of the order made the exact same way. I will take these six with me today so I can begin my practice." Li Yu waved his hand over the table and the six heavy weapons vanished into his spatial ring.

"Take them." Zhan Ku nodded.

"But you will have to be patient for the rest. Come back in exactly one month and you can pick up the remaining weapons. I have other clan orders and armor repairs to fulfill. I cannot just focus entirely on your custom batch."

"I understand." Li Yu smiled.

"One month is perfectly fine. Thank you again for your hard work." Li Yu left the forge and stepped back out into the bright sunlight. He felt a sense of anticipation now for his full arsenal. He was eager to return to his lakes and finally test his new orbiting armory in the open air.