Danmachi- Hell’s Forge

Grinding

The wood was still horribly rough and definitely not anything like the image I had in my head but it still proved that my idea was feasible.

"Are you alright?" Hestia asked far more concerned about me since I was slouching from exhaustion as most of my energy had just been consumed.

"I'm fine. Just a bit drained is all, but look it worked!" I said showing her the wood.

She studied it carefully "Well it isn't rotten anymore and the shape is a little different but it's kinda rough isn't it?" she asked confused.

"That's actually my fault. I didn't realize just how fast using the spell would drain my energy and only had enough to change it to this point." I said honestly.

"I see. This looks like a really useful magic and it's pretty too, congratulations!" Hestia said with a bright smile.

"Thanks. I bet if I focus on repairing the church bit by bit I can train my magic stat really quick!" I said with an eager grin.

"You aren't going into the dungeon?" Hestia asked surprised and I shook my head.

"Not yet, I need to raise my stats first through good old physical training or I am like as not just going to struggle pointlessly. Unlike most newbie adventurers I have actually seen a goblin before and I know for a fact fighting just one of them would be a struggle for me at the moment not to mention according to the girls in the Artemis familia the things rarely are alone." I said seriously.

"Umu, better safe than sorry." she said agreeing that my plan made sense.

After that we went to sleep with her in the bed and me on the couch that was not the most comfortable but not horrible either. Unfortunately I learned a rather bothersome fact about my goddess when I woke up in the morning, she was clingy. Sometime in the middle of the night she had gone from the bed to on the couch using me as a body pillow. Let me tell you there is nothing more awkward than waking up with morning wood only to find that a small but beautiful woman was rubbing on it unconsciously since it was poking her in her sleep.-

Even worse was when she woke up and realized what she was doing shortly after you did, the silence was deafening. We ate a couple pieces of cheap bread with tomato red faces for about thirty minutes before she went off to her day job selling jagamarukun which were basically potato croquettes or deep fried breaded mashed potatoes with salt or sometimes meat. I on the other hand found an exposed board in the upstairs chapel room and poured most of my energy into it to try and restore it to perfect condition.-

That lasted for all of about a second before I was out of energy because as it turned out size DOES matter when it came to how much energy something took to change with my cursed technique. While I was waiting for my energy to refill I got to work working out with my new weapon. Since I was going to be carrying the thing around constantly in the Dungeon it only made sense that I also worked out with it so that I could get accustomed to handling it. For example I went jogging and carried it with me despite my body not liking the misplaced weight at all.-

My legs were used to carrying some extra weight from the gut I used to have but my arms were screaming in pain as I jogged. I had to switch hands a few times before my legs were also burning from exertion and I was out of breath. After that was crunches to work on my core strength and then practice swings with my weapon to work on my form. Let me tell you swinging a twenty pound object with one arm without losing balance was not easy at all with average human strength. I stumbled and fell several times but I was stubborn like that and never stopped until my arms were both feeling like jello.-

Ignoring my own pain I dragged my weary body into the church and after depositing the weapon bellow went back to the wooden board I had worked on previously to burn through my refilled energy pool again. Once that was done I sat on the floor next to it to wait for my goddess to return while using any energy I refilled during that time to slowly, bit by bit, restore the wood to perfect condition. Hestia returned about an hour or so before the sun went down with a bag of leftover food from her stall that hadn't been sold.-

"Are you going to be okay?" She asked worriedly when I groaned and shook while standing up.

"Yeah I'll be fine, just feeling the pain that comes with working out is all." I said reassuringly despite knowing I probably over did it.

No I DEFINITELY overdid it as after eating I went to sleep and woke up feeling like I went five rounds with Tyson. I spent the next three days recovering while using my cursed technique every chance I got. Waking up every morning with my goddess using me as a body pillow had also sort of become a habit we didn't talk about ever.-

She wasn't flirting or anything like that which was the only reason I knew that she wasn't doing it intentionally and chose to just go with the flow and ignore it as a result. My next workout session on the fourth day was much more relaxed than my first and I stopped the moment my muscles started to really ache. I was making good progress on repairing the church though as I had fully restored exactly two wooden boards for all my effort. At the end of the week Hestia updated my falna and I got to see if it was worth it.-

Name: Alexander Drake

Race: Human

Level:1

Strength:10(I) ->47(I)

Endurance:10(I)->83(I)

Agility:10(I)->39(I)

Dexterity:10(I)->24(I)

Magic:10(I)->179(H)

Spells: Hell's forge(Innate technique): Can use anything from a living being and reshape or refine it per ones will.(Incantation: Hell's forge)

Skills: Heavenly restriction: In exchange for the ability to wield mana and magic one gains access to cursed energy and cursed techniques.

Honestly speaking I wasn't surprised at all to find that my fasted growing stats were magic and endurance considering what they represented. Each stat in the falna had specific purposes and thus got increased by performing actions related to them and endurance was your stamina and literal toughness stat. By over working my muscles I had seriously pushed the stat forward since I had overwhelmed my bodies natural durability. As for magic that was basically increased by simply using as much mana or in this case cursed energy as possible and working the power to it's fullest at level one. Increasing the magic stat also had the wonderful bonus of also increasing ones efficiency and volume of energy.