Thanks to my days of forging weapons until my MP ran dry, my Weapon Forging skill reached Level 10.
At the same time, the Weapon Forging skill evolved into a higher-tier Skill.
The name of the new Skill was Fantasy Weapon Forging.
As the "Fantasy" in the name might suggest, this Skill granted the ability to bestow special effects upon forged weapons.
However, the effects were predetermined. At Level 1, I could only imbue one out of five possible effects.
Those effects were: Divine Blessing, Elemental Attack Addition, Status Ailment Attack Addition, Auto Repair, and Auto Recovery.
Divine Blessing increased the equipment's defense.
To some extent, it also raised resistance against elements and status ailments.
It was a permanently active type that consumed neither MP nor SP, but as a trade-off, the effect was relatively modest.
Elemental Attack Addition, as the name implied, let me bestow an elemental attack property on a weapon.
It didn't add a permanent element — instead, it was a triggered type activated at will, consuming the wielder's MP upon activation.
Status Ailment Attack Addition worked almost identically to Elemental Attack Addition, with the only difference being that it consumed SP instead.
Auto Repair automatically restored durability lost to a weapon over time.
No MP or SP consumption required.
It was a modest effect, but perfect for anyone who wanted to keep using their beloved weapon indefinitely.
The last one, Auto Recovery, was a combined effect of the Skill's HP Auto Recovery and MP Recovery Speed.
It didn't recover SP, but conversely, it didn't consume any either.
The effect was weaker compared to the standalone Skill, but since it didn't conflict with that Skill, the recovery speed would stack, making it even faster.
The effects might seem somewhat underwhelming for something called "Fantasy," but their power should not be underestimated.
For a straightforward boost to offensive power, you'd pick Elemental Attack Addition or Status Ailment Attack Addition.
If you wanted to bolster your defense, you'd go with Divine Blessing.
For sustained combat capability or securing MP through magic, Auto Recovery was the choice.
If weapon preservation was the priority, Auto Repair.
Each was simple, which was precisely what made them so versatile.
However, there was a catch.
This special effect bestowment consumed MP.
The strength of the effect depended on the amount of MP spent — the more MP you invested, the better the result.
What mattered here was that the weapon being imbued with a special effect was itself also being forged using MP at the same time.
Special effects could only be applied at the moment of forging.
You couldn't forge a weapon first and then add a special effect afterward.
That meant to bestow a special effect, you had to use the MP remaining after forging the weapon.
My MP was finite.
Until now, I'd been fine pouring all of my MP into weapon forging to create the best possible weapon.
But with special effects in the mix, it wasn't that simple.
Since my MP was limited, I had to choose: lower the weapon's quality and add a special effect, raise the weapon's quality and abandon special effects, or settle for a weak effect.
I had to pick one or the other.
Though my MP had grown considerably, with the amount I had, I couldn't produce satisfactory results in both areas.
I had evolved into a Goblin Shaman.
This was the result of power-leveling by the monster-using human, Vurimus.
Vurimus would bring back tamed Monsters and have me kill them.
The tamed Monsters couldn't fight back even when I attacked them.
And they would be struck down by me, over and over, until they died.
Using this method, I was able to safely defeat higher-level Monsters and raise my Level.
When I reached Level 10 and met the evolution conditions, Vurimus ordered me to evolve into a Shaman.
The purpose was to increase my MP.
Shamans had strong growth in magic-related Stats, and their MP growth was better compared to other evolution paths.
To secure enough MP for weapon forging, there was probably no choice but to go with Shaman.
The performance of weapons created through weapon forging scaled with the amount of MP invested.
The more MP I had, the better the weapons I could make.
There was no upper limit to that, and that was precisely why I was forced into this dilemma between weapon quality and special effects.
Well, I was only making the weapons they ordered. I didn't care how they turned out.
If anything, I wished the effects came with some kind of drawback — I'd gladly attach it.
After evolving into a Shaman and raising my Level, my combat ability had improved.
My Stats had grown, and I'd trained my Skills whenever I could.
But still, no opportunity to escape Vurimus's control had come.
I'd also learned their language by now.
This part came relatively easily.
My prior experience learning Goblin from scratch served me well, and above all, Vurimus's commands were clear in meaning even when I didn't know the exact words.
From there, understanding and memorizing the language's meaning didn't take long.
There were still many words I didn't know, so I couldn't say I'd mastered it completely.
But considering that at the start I couldn't even tell whether "Vurimus" was a name or whether "Captain" was the name, I'd improved considerably.
Now that I knew their language, I eavesdropped on their conversations to gather information.
If there was anything among that intel that could serve as a catalyst for breaking free of this situation, that would be something.
What had caught my attention lately was that Vurimus seemed to be in a hurry about something.
Vurimus had apparently been a general of considerable rank in some great nation called the Empire, but had made some major blunder and been reassigned here as punishment.
He appeared desperate to earn a merit of some kind and return to the homeland as quickly as possible.
The reason he was so anxious to get back.
The mistake he'd made before.
These might have nothing to do with escaping this situation, but they could lead to finding a weakness in Vurimus.
I'd keep collecting information.