Chapter 227 Yew Staff and Soaked Sponge

As one of the most reputable smithies in Rivervale Town, Rockhammer Smithy might not offer the most generous prices when it came to buying back equipment.

However, thanks to its stellar reputation and the connections its owner, Barn, had cultivated over the years, the shop had forged deep ties with a considerable number of adventurers.

This meant that even if they made a few less gold coins, they were still willing to sell their spoils to the straightforward, burly dwarf.

Over the years, he had interacted with countless adventurers and bought back gear from an innumerable number of customers.

Even without intentionally studying the subject, Barn's incredibly rich experience had passively taught him how to deduce information—such as a party's quest objective, the smoothness of their journey, and the types of enemies they had faced—just by examining the spoils they brought in.

Light wear like scratches, dents, and chipped edges; heavy damage such as notches, snaps, and severe warping; signs of melting, freezing, or acid corrosion; and even the adventurer's expression and the state of their gear when selling the loot—all of it allowed him to speculate on what they had encountered during their adventure.

Just now, Xia Nan had first produced a pair of standard daggers from the Underdark, a type commonly used by rogues. Then, he had pulled out a rare, peculiarly effective Enchanted Stone Spear that most likely originated from the seaside.

Coupled with this snapped Yew Staff, it was hard not to suspect that the young man had clashed with an entire adventurer squad during his journey.

Considering that the person standing before him right now was Xia Nan himself—rather than some other adventurer coming in to trade his Decapitating Longsword or Green Pine wooden sword.

His armor was heavily damaged, yet he bore no obvious injuries.

The outcome of that clash was easy to imagine.

Barn's gaze subconsciously swept toward the bottom of the counter, glancing at the Plate-Chain Composite Armor waiting to be repaired, its surface marred by hideous claw marks.

He had his suspicions, but maintaining his professional ethics, he didn't ask a single unnecessary question.

Instead, he silently accepted the staff Xia Nan handed over and inspected it carefully.

"The grain is fine and smooth, and the surface luster is a bit dull. It has a yellowish-brown hue, with tiny knots in some places. The growth rings aren't very distinct. The quality is mediocre."

"But it's definitely yew wood, no mistake about that," Barn said, lightly tapping his knuckles against the staff. The sound was dull and muffled.

Even though he was a "blacksmith," as a professional forger capable of crafting magic equipment, Barn also had a fair amount of knowledge regarding non-metallic materials, though he wasn't quite as proficient with them.

"The wood itself lacks toughness." His thick, radish-like fingers rubbed against the fractured end of the staff. "Since a poor cut of material was chosen, it would easily snap if subjected to slightly more force or a heavy fall."

"The craftsmanship is also exceedingly... plain."

"There's no metal reinforcement, nor can I see any engraved runic patterns. It hasn't even been properly polished. If you just hacked off a random branch, whittled it round, and gave it a quick sand, it would look about the same as this."

"This probably came from some Mage Apprentice who just crossed the threshold and isn't very wealthy, or perhaps a novice craftsman whose skills are still unrefined?"

"If you want to sell this back to me—"

"Hm? Wait—"

From Xia Nan's perspective, after taking the staff, Barn was flipping the gear over and muttering his assessment to himself, just as he had done before.

Even though Xia Nan didn't know much about this field and couldn't understand the occasional piece of professional jargon popping out of the dwarf's mouth, Barn's demeanor made it clear he had a deep understanding of the equipment presented to him.

Hearing Barn's analysis of the Yew Staff, Xia Nan gave up whatever lingering hope he had of selling it for a fortune.

Although it was a weapon used by a spellcaster, it had already been snapped by an Owlbear, and its craftsmanship was thoroughly ordinary. It probably wasn't worth much.

But what he hadn't expected was this.

Barn had practically finished his inspection. His arm had even begun to move forward, intending to hand the Yew Staff back to Xia Nan.

Yet at the very last moment, the blacksmith suddenly seemed to discover something.

His hands abruptly paused, and he pulled the wooden staff back.

Leaning his head closer, his copper-coin-sized eyes widened until they were almost pressed flat against the staff's surface. His brow furrowed deeper and deeper, and the words tumbling from his mouth grew increasingly indistinct.

He ended up spending even more time examining the Yew Staff than he had on the daggers and the stone spear combined.

Even when he finally placed the staff back on the counter, he remained silent, his brow knit deep in thought.

Two or three minutes passed before he abruptly raised his head and slowly asked, "This staff... if you're willing to disclose it, may I ask its origins?"

"A suspected spellcaster belonging to the Druid class," Xia Nan replied. Since the investigation quest had already been completed and submitted, there was no harm in sharing information about Mint, as long as it didn't involve [Tears of Spring Breath]. "She was also a Lycanthrope."

"A Druid Lycanthrope..."

Barn crossed his thick arms over his chest. As his muscles bulged, his brow furrowed ever tighter, leaving it a mystery as to what he was pondering.

In the end, he stared at the staff for a long while, as if trying to confirm something, before finally informing Xia Nan of his findings.

"I'm very sorry, but you might need to find an expert with the corresponding appraisal skills to determine the true nature of this staff."

"Its exterior looks crude and natural, and its interior is much the same. No matter how you look at it, it should just be an ordinary, commonly seen, snapped staff."

"I'm confident I'm not wrong about that point."

"But the bizarre thing is, compared to common mundane gear—or even enchanted weapons with special effects—this Yew Staff gives off a profound, viscous feeling."

"That might sound a bit abstract, and you might not be able to feel it, but to craftsmen like us who have handled countless types of gear, that sensation is incredibly distinct."

"If I had to describe it, it's like a rigid sponge absolutely soaked with water. To the touch, it just feels like the texture of normal wood, but if you can sense the "moisture" condensed on its surface and carefully trace that "dampness," you'll be able to discover what makes it different."

Barn's explanation piqued Xia Nan's curiosity. Unable to resist, he picked the staff up off the counter, focused his mind, and carefully felt it.

To his surprise—perhaps because his Perception, which far exceeded that of an ordinary person, had silently taken effect—after Barn's prompt, the staff that had previously seemed completely unremarkable actually felt as though it had undergone some sort of change.

It absolutely wasn't just his imagination.

Even without the blacksmith's vast experience with equipment, which meant his grasp of the specific details differed, Xia Nan could still faintly yet clearly sense that layer of formless substance—like a gas, yet like a liquid—congealed on the surface of the staff.

"What is this?" Xia Nan couldn't help but ask.

"You can feel it!?"

Seeing that Xia Nan actually seemed to feel the difference between the staff and standard gear, a look of surprise washed over Barn's face. He paused for a moment before replying, "I can't say for sure, but I've seen something similar twice before."

"The first time was back when I was still honing my craft in my clan, before I ever came to Rivervale Town. It was on an iron ingot stained with crimson blood, provided as a material during a certain round of our clan's forging competition."

"To be safe, I chose not to use it to forge my equipment for the match. Because of that, the ingot was chosen by another blacksmith whose skills were roughly on par with mine. Hmm... he didn't advance to the next round."

"The second time was three years ago, brought in by an adventurer who has since left town. It was an exquisite ceremonial dagger that ended up being bought by some deep-pocketed collector from Nym City."

"I remember it very clearly, because that transaction earned me nearly three hundred gold coins."

"And I must clarify that the bloodstained iron ingot, the ceremonial dagger, and this snapped Yew Staff... the feelings they give me are generally similar, yet distinctly different in the finer details."

Xia Nan's fingertips lightly brushed against the staff's surface. Along with the cold, hard texture unique to the wood, that invisible gaseous substance wrapping the exterior seemed to stick and congeal wherever his fingers pressed down.

As his mind digested the information Barn had provided, Xia Nan couldn't help but feel a pang of regret.

Perhaps it was because the Yew Staff was completely snapped, or perhaps it simply didn't possess the properties of "equipment" in the first place.

As a result, no matter how hard Xia Nan focused, he couldn't view its Attribute Panel—he had already tried doing so many times before coming here.

This was also the reason Xia Nan had brought it to the smithy.

He had hoped Barn could provide some assistance, at least letting him know whether it was valuable, or how much it might be worth.

Now, after the dwarf had pointed all of this out, things had instead become complicated.

It would have been better to just keep it simple—treat it as a completely ruined, ordinary staff, and sell it straight away.

Stuck in this awkward limbo, he was afraid of missing out on a massive payout if he sold it, yet keeping it was completely useless to him.

It left him feeling even more conflicted.

"I can't just spend money to buy an Identify scroll, can I?"

If the appraisal results were disappointing, he would take a massive loss on this adventure.

To this dilemma, Barn once again offered his advice.

"Since you're planning to consign the stone spear at the Adventurers' Association, you might as well take this Yew Staff over there, too."

"I remember that for professional adventurers with the qualifications to access the second floor, the Association provides relatively inexpensive appraisal services... Of course, you often have to make an appointment in advance and wait in line for a while."

"Those professional appraisers hired by the Association might not be spellcasters, and they might not know Identify, but their eyes are absolutely trustworthy."

"Especially for bizarre things like this, their experience is definitely far greater than mine."

'Appraisers? That's a thing?'

'Why didn't Molly mention this to me before?'

Xia Nan couldn't help but grumble inwardly.

Then again, it wasn't like he had taken the initiative to ask, either.

Expressing his thanks to Barn once more, Xia Nan stowed the staff back into his backpack.

It was clear to see that, compared to when he had pulled it out earlier, his movements were now noticeably more careful.

After staying at the Rockhammer Smithy a little longer to discuss the details regarding the upgrade for his [Snake-Scale Arm Shield], Xia Nan bid his farewells, left the shop, and headed back in the direction of the Association.

Walking down the bustling streets, his gaze swept over the diverse crowd of adventurers ahead of him.

Xia Nan calculated in his mind.

The custom-made [Bone-Bound Iron Greaves] he had commissioned from Barn earlier had cost him a full 500 gold.

And that was even with him providing the primary materials and receiving a discount on the labor and secondary materials from the blacksmith.

Now, although the upgrade for the [Snake-Scale Arm Shield] similarly didn't require him to purchase the primary material, the quality of the pitch-black snake scales from the Eastern Secret Realm was absolutely much higher than the bone clubs used to craft his greaves.

Correspondingly, the tier of the equipment crafted from it would definitely be several levels higher. It might even turn out to be the first piece of purple-grade gear in his life.

Coupled with all the other miscellaneous fees...

500 gold was absolutely not going to be enough!

Yet right now, Xia Nan's total net worth...

Subtracting the 45 gold required to repair his armor, adding the 53 gold from Veris's poison and the beholder materials, the 37 gold for the two daggers, the loose gold coins looted from the bodies of Cash and Veris, and his bank savings... it all came to 554 gold, 2 silver, 6 copper, and 9 points.

As for the reward for his Advancement Quest in Nym City, after Molly fought for him with the Association, it had been bumped up a tier. It was distributed a month ago, and Xia Nan had split it into 30 gold and 5 points.

As for the remaining 4 points, they came from the beast-clearing quests he had taken with the Sea Thorn Squad over the past month and a half.

The level of these commissions was inherently the lowest tier on the second floor's quest board, and since he had to split the rewards evenly with his teammates upon completion, it was naturally slower to save up points.

Later on, once Xia Nan began undertaking adventures as a lone wolf, his efficiency should be much higher.

He estimated that it would only take about half a year to save up for a normal-quality combat technique.

He not only had to prepare funds to buy the "Remove Curse" spell scroll, but he also had to plan for the upgrade of his [Snake-Scale Arm Shield].

"Where should I even get all this gold...?"

Pondering ways to make money, Xia Nan returned to the Adventurers' Association once more.

By now, evening had arrived, and it looked like it was almost time for the receptionist Molly to get off work.

Sitting behind the counter, she lacked the listlessness she usually displayed during the day. She sat fairly straight, yet she radiated a visible, impatient eagerness.

As the light outside the doors gradually dimmed, the frequency with which she peeked at the clock on the nearby wall only increased; she was eagerly anticipating the moment her shift ended.

And it was exactly because of her frequent glances toward the main entrance that the moment Xia Nan stepped into the Association, she noticed him.

"Mr. Xia Nan, I've already posted your commission on the quest wall to find a spellcaster who knows 'Remove Curse' or similar spells," she said.

"As for the results of the Lycanthrope investigation quest, it is still undergoing review and confirmation. You'll need to wait three days, I—"

Seeing the short-haired girl hurriedly jog out from behind the counter to greet him, Xia Nan waved his hand at her.

"I'm not here for that."

He hefted the [Tide-Surge Lure Pole] strapped to his back, which was wrapped in a cotton cloth Barn had gifted him, and asked Molly, "I heard the Association can consign equipment for sale?"

Hearing this, Molly blanked for a moment. Then, looking as guilty as a thief, she cautiously scanned her surroundings. Seeing that no one was paying attention to them, she deliberately lowered her voice and said, "Yes, sir. But for ordinary-quality gear, I actually highly recommend you sell it to a smithy or general store in town."

"After all, their processing fees are much cheaper than the Association's, the transaction is faster, and there aren't as many annoying procedures."

In response, Xia Nan merely stared at her in silence.

Seeing his reaction, Molly suddenly understood, realizing that what he needed to consign wasn't the "ordinary gear" she had mentioned.

Knowing there were too many prying eyes in the lobby, she didn't spell it out either. Instead, she turned sideways and directly led Xia Nan toward the staircase.

"It's right up on the second floor, Mr. Xia Nan."

"I'll show you the way."