He Became the Genius Blacksmith of the Namgung Family - Chapter 3

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 3

Episode 3

‘Cheongeumjeong ‘.

This is the name of the blacksmith’s forge operated by the Namgung Family.

It could truly be called the finest forge in Anhui.

All the blacksmiths belonging to this finest forge are branch members of the Namgung family.

Moreover, they are composed of master-level blacksmiths and above.

Therefore, the ‘weapons’ made at Cheongeumjeong were extraordinary.

For this reason, external distribution of weapons made at Cheongeumjeong was quite difficult.

Weapons crafted by master-level blacksmiths and above are at least mid-high grade or better.

Thus, if they had no intention of strengthening other martial families through indiscriminate external distribution, the distribution had to be strict.

The weapons of Cheongeumjeong could be seen as almost exclusively for the warriors of the Namgung Family.

The confidence of a great martial family could be said to even take care of the convenience of their warriors.

So if you make something carelessly, you’re screwed.

“Die, you martial world scoundrel—”

Snap.

“Gasp!”

“Kahaha! A warrior of the Namgung Family who doesn’t even properly maintain his weapon! You’re the one who should die!”

Slash!

“Argh!”

Cheongeumjeong, my secure retirement plan.

The shadow of the Namgung Family that protects me from the Heterodox Faction and rogues.

However, make one weapon wrong and it’s a workplace resignation recommendation.

No! That can’t happen!

In a world without a labor office, even if you get fired you can’t express your grievances, and you can’t file for unemployment benefits either.

Well, with my master-level blacksmith skills I wouldn’t starve to death anywhere, but the threat of getting stabbed in the belly is now an undeniable reality.

So I have no choice but to make them sturdy, high-quality, and damn sharp.

Because of this, Cheongeumjeong weapons are so sturdy they rarely break.

There’s hardly any work making new swords.

Most of it is just repairing chipped swords, sharpening blades on whetstones, reheating and refining, or processing raw materials.

I can make a living from general commission items, but it’s meager pay compared to warriors.

Well, still, commissions for other items aren’t as demanding as weapons, so I can accept them.

That’s why blacksmiths belonging to Cheongeumjeong usually keep one or two apprentices around.

The apprentices mostly handled sharpening and repairing finished weapons, while skilled craftsmen filled their pockets with commissions for other items.

“But I’m alone!”

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Why?

Because I’m young?

‘I can’t say no, my young age does play a part.’

However, there’s a bigger problem.

I have no intention of passing on my knowledge right now, and even if I did, there’s no one who could follow this.

Training an apprentice means raising a disciple as a master, so I’d have to teach them, wouldn’t I?

They’d have to be able to follow along to make teaching worthwhile.

Ah, was this how Mozart felt when he saw Salieri?

Fortunately, there isn’t only Salieri.

There is Mozart-level talent.

“Old Master Mak.”

Should I really call him a ‘genius’?

He understood future refining methods and applied them immediately?

I came to understand Salieri’s feelings.

Well, a few of the senior blacksmiths at Cheongeumjeong could probably follow about one-tenth if I taught them…

It’s a bit awkward for a guy who’s barely even twenty to boss around people who are over forty and approaching fifty, isn’t it?

There’s no age limit to learning.

As someone with the soul of a modern person who values respecting elders, I can’t bring myself to order around people in their fifties.

Besides, who would give up their master-level blacksmith position to become a disciple again?

In any era, people who give up power they’ve gained and start over from the beginning are rare.

“So I have to do it all myself. Sigh.”

How tiresome.

This genius of mine that knows the future and can use that knowledge!

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Namgung Cheon-gang is currently earning pocket money.

A personal commission has come to him from none other than the Namgung Family’s restaurant.

The item is a kitchen knife.

No, how did they use a kitchen knife to make it break cleanly in half vertically?

Looking at how it broke, I was amazed.

“Even if you tell me to do it, I can’t!”

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The reason I received a personal commission?

It’s nothing special.

The cook at a restaurant belonging to the Namgung Family whose kitchen knife broke fell in love after seeing the kitchen knife used by the cook at Chungpung Guesthouse.

The fluttering of Cheonghongju’s wings returned as a storm of crafting commissions.

“When I’ve received a personal commission, how can I make it carelessly?”

The head cook of my salary-paying boss’s family.

I must make it with all my heart, sturdier.

So it will never break vertically again!

Clang! Clang! Clang!

After about half a day passed like this.

Ding!

A collaboration between the finished product felt through my hands and the system.

Is it because I awakened?

I’m definitely making masterpieces better than before.

I put down the hammer, picked up the kitchen knife, put it in water, then scraped off the grime and wiped it clean with leather.

The brilliant silver blade was clearly revealed to the world, properly certifying it as a masterpiece.

Look at that reflection of my face.

It’s like a mirror.

Namgung Cheon-gang nodded with satisfaction.

It’s a bit disappointing that my stats don’t go up when I make masterpieces after awakening.

* * *

The Namgung Family was huge.

So there are damn many people who belong to it.

Warriors, servants, maids, retainers, family members, and so on.

If you count them one by one, it easily exceeds a thousand.

Many people?

There have to be many places to eat.

So there are as many as five restaurants.

‘Namgung Samgeupryu’ is one of them.

A place where mainly first-rate and below warriors gather to eat.

In military terms, you could call it the enlisted soldiers’ mess hall.

Amazingly, the cook of Namgung Samgeupryu, ‘Namgung Apdo’, was formerly from a military mess hall long ago.

Thanks to that, the taste of the food is truly ‘military rations’ itself!

His hands preparing the ingredients were filled with the passion of a battlefield!

How desperate must he have been for a kitchen knife made by the Namgung Family to split vertically in half?

Still, seeing him get depressed over a broken kitchen knife, one had to acknowledge his sincerity toward cooking.

Namgung Apdo’s gloom disappeared within half a day.

Because the newly ordered kitchen knife arrived in just half a day.

“Ooooh!”

Rising at dawn, a habit from his military days.

Namgung Apdo admired the kitchen knife he had received last night.

It gleamed like a jewel, as if the light of dawn’s first rays had settled on the blade.

The blade of this kitchen knife in his hands was truly extraordinary!

“Huhuhuh. Good, very good! As expected, the items made by Cheongeumjeong’s blacksmiths are all masterpieces! Somehow I feel like my cooking will be even better today!”

Namgung Apdo was excited.

Looking at the blade made his body itch with eagerness to use it.

He rushed to his workplace in one stride and began trimming and cutting the ingredients he had prepared last night.

Tadadadadak!

Dodododo!

Tadak! Tadadadadak!

“Ooooh! What incredible feel!”

The moment the blade touched the firm radish, a thin membrane peeled away smoothly.

The same happened when cutting cucumber.

As if the kitchen knife was finding the most perfect grain of the ingredient, slice by slice!

The cut surfaces sparkled, holding the moisture they had been hiding!

Wind has settled in this kitchen knife!

“Ooooh!!!”

Namgung Apdo had awakened.

* * *

Namgung Samgeupryu had only five people in total: the head cook, sous chef, and assistants.

Just five people making meals for hundreds, so taste was out of the question.

But even so, it was too tasteless, even for that!

“Kyaaaong!”

A stray cat visited once, screamed, and never came back again – no further explanation needed.

The biggest cause was that head cook Namgung Apdo’s cooking, honed on battlefields against northern barbarians, prioritized nutrition over taste.

Of course, the nutrition was truly solid, so the bodies of the warriors eating at Namgung Samgeupryu improved day by day.

If only he could focus on taste as much as nutrition.

“Sigh… last night’s dinner was good though.”

“Indeed it was.”

Last night, because Namgung Apdo’s kitchen knife had broken, they had no choice but to order food from Chungpung Guesthouse.

A satisfying dinner within the family compound for the first time in years.

They thought it would last a few days.

The dream was shattered.

Because of the kitchen knife delivered in just half a day!

“Damn, I was hoping for guesthouse food today too, but Namgung Apdo’s cooking is back!”

“Argh! Cheongeumjeong!”

“Namgung Cheon-gang, you bastard!”

“Working so diligently!”

“A day, no, two or three days of laziness would be fine, damn it!”

Anger erupted toward Namgung Cheon-gang, the knife maker at Cheongeumjeong who had caused this tragedy.

But what could they do?

They couldn’t curse someone for working hard.

Moreover, working diligently and well was the duty of a blacksmith belonging to Cheongeumjeong.

Making other items was the only way to fill the pockets of those with meager wages.

Low-wage workers had to understand each other.

“Sigh, let’s just eat.”

One needs to eat to have strength.

The warriors, resigned to reality and feeling gloomy, trudged weakly into Namgung Samgeupryu.

“Welcome, soldiers of Namgung! Eat well! Hahahaha!”

“Yes…”

“We’ll eat well…”

The warriors who came to eat gave perfunctory bows to Namgung Apdo’s greeting and trudged over to pick up the prepared meal trays.

Serving was self-service.

The food was buffet-style.

The soldiers all put small portions of food on their trays.

They took relatively more rice.

It was the most palatable menu item.

“Tsk tsk tsk. I keep telling you, eating only rice like that creates nutritional imbalance and harms your health! You need to eat plenty of meat and vegetables too. Sigh, such troublesome ones. I’ll serve you!”

Namgung Apdo, who had been watching, clicked his tongue and piled food high on the warriors’ trays.

‘Ahhh!’

‘It’s a demon! There’s a demon here!!’

‘Kyaaaak!’

The warriors screamed internally.

They wanted to say something.

But seeing that kind face genuinely worried about people, they couldn’t bring themselves to speak.

Besides, wasn’t Namgung Apdo somewhat strong?

He was very strong.

Incredible real combat experience from rolling around battlefields against northern barbarians.

On top of that, his martial realm as a warrior was peak intermediate level.

‘Honestly, even without battlefield experience or martial realm, he looks like he could catch a bear with that physique. Who would dare oppose him?’

‘Why is someone like that not in the Namgung Family’s Martial Arts Order but working as a cook in a mere restaurant!’

Absurd!

Both his martial realm and cooking skills!

However, they couldn’t resist that absurdity.

The warriors had no choice but to swallow their tears and eat the mountain of food.

Making faces like eating bitter persimmons, they took a bite.

“Hm?”

“Huh?”

“Oh?”

What’s this?

This taste?

Something, something is different from usual!?

Their eyes widened with one bite and their tongues seemed to go “oh my.”

Did they taste it wrong?

Once more.

Nom.

“…!!!!”

Exclamation marks flashed above the warriors’ heads.

“It’s tasty, it’s actually tasty!!”

“My tongue has come alive!”

“Wooooh!!”

The military rations were delicious.

Namgung Apdo’s cooking was fantastic.

The warriors’ faces were filled with expressions of shock at this unbelievable fact.

Their hands and mouths don’t rest.

Hurriedly, ravenously.

Food gets sucked into their mouths.

“One more bowl!”

“Eat up, yeah!!”

“Charge! To the food!!”

The warriors rushed forward.

Once, twice, and more they devoured.

Something impossible was happening at Namgung Samgeupryu!

“Hehe. I knew my sincere cooking would eventually pay off.”

Namgung Apdo looked pleased as he watched the frenzied warriors.

‘No way.’

‘No matter what, the head cook’s food is still…’

The assistant cooks quietly denied it.

But they were curious.

About why those who had always been disgusted by Namgung Apdo’s cooking were acting like this.

The assistants hadn’t tried the dish he made.

‘Did he poison it or something?’

* * *

Ting ting ting!

“Hm?”

Namgung Cheon-gang was hammering ore.

Message windows suddenly appeared in front of Namgung Cheon-gang.

“…??”

What’s this?

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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