Spending My Retirement In A Game

"Not just 'like' those, you will make those," Eisen smiled, "Mix them at a 1:4 ratio, magic stone to glass, and play around with the pigments a bit too. Don't just mix the pigments into a black mass though, make sure they stay vibrant."

Parc and Rouge smiled excitedly, their cheeks nearly tearing open with how excited they seemed. Until now, Eisen would just have them work on their own projects, or they would help out with Eisen doing his own projects by holding things, keeping materials at a specific temperature while Eisen was doing something else, or simply helping him prep things.

This was the first time they were allowed to fully make an aspect of one of Eisen's items.

"Make them at a few different measurements. 2:2:1, ratio for the sizes. Quarter-inch, half-inch, and whole-inch," Eisen instructed them, and the two young men nodded as they picked up the heavy bags of silica and limestone. He prepared a place for them to properly mix up the glass, and then got to work on his own part of the toys.

The first thing he would get started with were the toys' bodies. For this, he had a few different ways of going about it, but the best way to make sure the toys would be as durable as possible was to make the different parts of the bodies separately, meaning the torso, limbs, head, etc, and then connect them with durable metal pins.

The metal would be under most of the stress when the toys were moved around instead of the wood, which should make sure that they would last much longer.

And so, Eisen grabbed the first cube of Ash Beech. He would be able to turn each cube into enough parts for two toys. He came up with a few different animals that he wanted to carve. Horses, Lions, Wolves, Stags, and Elephants. Those were common animals that could be seen around on the paintings and stitchings around the nomad giants' town, so he figured they were good choices.

The old man grabbed Bai and turned the Ego Tool into a carving knife. Its body seemed to shiver slightly in excitement whenever Eisen used it for a project, which was certainly a unique experience to have with your tools.

Of course, Eisen didn't blame Bai for getting so excited; he was happy that it enjoyed the work as much as he himself did, rather than potentially coming to hate it as he was scared once Bai gained proper sentience.

"Alright alright, calm down now, or else we can't stop working," Eisen said, and Bai quickly stopped, as it always did. And so, Eisen placed the edge of the knife against the wood. His body grew in size slightly as he assumed his True Demonic form, and started to carve. To speed up the process, he created some duplicates, who copied his work exactly.

That way, he was able to work many times faster, which was quite useful when it came to matters where he had to make 200 toys.

Before Eisen knew it, Parc and Rouge had finished making 400 pairs of eyes. He took a glance at them, and they were all quite beautiful, really. Strands of colour flowed through them, and they would be perfect for something like toys, "Good job," Eisen told his apprentices, "You guys remember my go-to enchantment for eyes?"

Rouge quickly nodded, but was hesitant, "You... want us to even enchant them?"

Eisen turned toward them and nodded, "Of course. You started making the eyes, so you better finish them too," the old man said, "And after you're done with the eyes, you'll get started on the golem cores too."

The two young men were a bit taken aback, but they knew not to question Eisen's words. When he said something, then he meant it. Instantly, the two of them got started, rushing over to the marble slate that they would use to transfer the enchantments onto the glass eyes one after another.

"Wait, here, you need to make that part thicker..." Rouge told Parc, who quickly corrected his mistake, before pointing at something across the table, "Can you give me the needle over there? I think this one is going blunt."

"Wait, which rune was it again? Ra, or Ri?"

"It was Ra, Ri is over there."

"Ah, true..."

Eisen watched the two of them work together on the eyes, and couldn't help but smile. This was why he liked taking in apprentices. Watching them grow bit by bit, it was like raising children, just without having to change their diapers. The old man smiled, and extended his hand to the right, "Sari, give me the wood polish."

Both Parc and Rouge turned around toward Eisen, "What? Who?"

Eisen raised a brow, confused, "Sari, one of..." the old man was taken aback, seeing his apprentices' expressions. That was when he realized what it was he had said, "...I don't... remember..."

"Are you okay? Do you need to maybe... rest?" Parc asked with a concerned expression, "We all know you don't sleep a lot anymore..."

Eisen smiled, trying to calm the two of them down, "Don't worry, I simply don't need much sleep anymore, so I actually end up sleeping more than needed."

"...If you're sure. Just take care of yourself well, you always tell us to. If you need to take a break, I'm sure nobody will deny you that," Rouge replied with a worried frown, but Eisen just chuckled slightly, "Really you two, I'm a hundred thousand years old, I know when I need to take a break. I just got lost in thought for a moment, so don't worry, really."

Slowly, it seemed like Eisen was able to convince Parc and Rouge, and the two continued to work. Now, the only one Eisen still had to convince was himself. He knew there was no need to even try with Kirisho, who was hanging off his neck in her pendant. He would never be able to convince her that everything was fine. Because it wasn't.

It was scary, he naturally did something as if it were engrained in his bones... and then forgot all about what it was just a moment later. If he didn't know better, then he would wonder if he was developing dementia. But even so, it was still weird. He could barely remember what he even said at some point. He had said a name, but he had already forgotten about it again.

Eisen didn't even know what it was he had tried to do anymore. But that didn't matter. For now, he just had to keep working. He stood up and walked over to where he kept the wood polish, and started to spread it on the pieces of the wooden figures that he had already finished.

He would do this for now so that they could dry while he was working on the rest, so that they would be able to assemble everything sooner.

The wood polish practically pulled forward the grain of the wood, as though it hadn't been there before. With a smile, he followed the grain with the piece of cloth in his hand, and then had a duplicate place the piece of wood onto a drying rack, before he continued carving and carving.

Before long, Parc and Rouge had finished enchanting the eyes, and the old man looked at them surprised, "Already? Wow, you guys are getting quicker and quicker, you'll overtake me soon."

The two apprentices smiled at each other with tired expressions, "Thank you, Eisen... but, erm... we know you probably want to keep working, but we're both pretty tired..." Rouge explained, and Eisen raised a brow. They were tired already? It's barely been half an hour since they started working, so how could they already be tired?

He was just about to ask what was going on, when the light reflected off the many glass eyes in the crate next to the apprentices. The sunlight, of a sun that was high above them, well past morning and approaching noon. They had started working in the evening last night.

"Oh... I guess I lost track of time. Don't worry, you guys can go rest. I'll continue for a while, so you guys just come back once your energy returned," the old man smiled, and the apprentices nodded, said goodnight, and then trodded toward Askr. Everyone had already nearly finished packing up, getting ready to keep moving toward their destination.

While most of Eisen's side would walk outside of the giant, the dungeon was still open to allow for emergencies, or for some people to keep working on certain matters inside of the dungeon. And of course, for people who stood guard or worked all night to get some rest during the day.

And now, because Eisen got lost in his work, his apprentices counted amongst those that needed to rest all day.