Aye, I’ll tell you a tale worth spitting into the fire for. Was down near the old iron veins past the Minoc Miners Guild South—sun just peeking over the ridge like it didn’t want to be seen—when I found a pocket so rich in ore, my pickaxe sang like a tuning fork each time it bit. The stone cracked clean, clean as a bell, and I swear I could smell the iron before I even saw it: that sharp, wet-metal tang rising from the fresh scar in the rock. My arms burned after the first dozen strikes, but I kept at it—fifty ingots, near fifty—I could feel the weight pulling me down like I’d strapped a dead donkey to my back. But there’s pride in that ache, you know? A man shapes stone and metal, and in turn, they shape him.
I limped into town with my pack groaning on my shoulders, boots scuffing dust all the way to the blacksmith’s forge behind the Carpenter’s shop. Heat hit me before I even stepped inside—blistering, thick, like walking into a dragon’s yawn. The fire roared, coals glowing red as fresh-killed meat, and I dropped my ingots on the stone with a clatter that made the tinker muttering in the corner flinch. I sold the lot to old Borin, the smith with the scarred knuckles and the voice of ground glass. He counted them slow, not because he didn’t trust me, but because he trusts nothing else. “Nearly fifty,” he said, “good weight.” Then he handed me not a single coin. Nothing. Just nodded toward the pile of scrap in the corner—broken picks, bent tongs, a shattered anvil arm. “Work for iron,” he grumbled. “You want gold, find a different god.”
I stood there, sweat cooling on my neck, staring at that junk heap. Felt the silence press in. But I picked up a warped pick, tested its balance. Might straighten. Might not. But the fire’s still hot, and my hands remember their trade. Come dawn, I’ll be back at the forge before the birds. Maybe not rich, but not broken—yet.<|im_end|>
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