Spending My Retirement In A Game

"So? I heard you’re here cause you wanna talk?" It asked, and Eisen slowly nodded his head, "Yes, that’s why we’re here. Come on, let’s talk about this a bit." The old man suggested, but all that the ego-item did was roll its eyes.

"Right, because you can have a proper conversation about this shit. You just want to scrap me anyway, right? I know I’m a disappointment, but-"

"Why would you be a disappointment?" The old man asked, and the ego-item lightly squinted its eyes, "That’s a joke, right? Maybe because I’m a Divine Quality item that you specifically made to create items on itself, but that’s incapable of actually doing that without failing. As you just fucking saw." The ego-item groaned and pointed at the ’corpse’ of the completely metallic one behind it.

"...What?" Eisen asked, "Why would I create a tool like you without wanting to use you? You’re obviously rather amazing, aren’t you?"

"Heh, you bet I am. You called me a masterpiece for a few moments, before actually seeing my status. Then you just threw me out." The ego-item said, "And so, I started creating items on my own. But they were all pieces of shit that crumbled at a touch. I managed to get to the point where I could create shitty ego-items like me, and then had them use me as a tool. But- Wait, why the fuck am I even telling you this, you know all of it. Fuck off before I smash you skull in, you old asshole."

"Wow... quite a lot of hostility here..." Xenia pointed out with a wry smile, and Brody simply stared at Eisen and the rather aggressive ego-item with a light squint, "Even I never swore at him like that. The fuck does this brat think he is?"

"Brody, did you just call him a brat? He literally looks your age." With a slight laugh, Evalia looked at the Demon-Orc next to her, while he just snapped his neck toward the young woman, "Oh fuck off, you know that’s just Brody from 80 thousand years ago popping in a bit."

"Yep, yep, of course. Don’t worry." The artist chuckled, although she would definitely use this to try and tease Brody a little bit. Xenia seemed to take mental notes on how she could use this against this martial-artist in the future as well.

Meanwhile, the ego-item was looking at everyone with a light squint, "Wait... the fuck’s going on? Why are all your items such low-rank ones, and why the fuck are those guys acting that way?" He asked, and Eisen slightly smiled at him, "Well, it’s a bit of a long story, I’d say, but the most important part is that we lost our experience together with our memories of our lives in this world."

"..." The Ego-item was staring back at Eisen with complete disbelief, while the old man just made his way over toward the ’dead’ ego-item currently laying on the ground, "Also, what you’re saying is simply not true. This guy’s body is of incredibly high quality. The materials were all well-chosen, well-mixed... If anything, I think its soul just wasn’t fully compatible."

"What’re you talking about, that’s just a rank 8 body, that’s complete trash."

"Well, rank 8 is higher than any item I’ve made so far. As far as I remember at least. Although that’s not right either, after all I remember the process of me creating you." Eisen explained, and the ego-item just glared back at him, "So none of you actually remember anything? You had to start from zero?"

"Yep, that’s about it." The old man replied. The ego-item thought about it for a moment and rubbed the bridge of his nose before starting to laugh, "That shit’s hilarious. Fine, let’s have a talk. Under one condition. You finally tell me why you’ve thrown me away like that, and no bullshit. Then I’ll talk to you. Otherwise, I’ll have to kill you, sorry ’bout that." The ego-item pointed out, and in reaction to that, Kiron seemed to get rather angry.

He took a step closer and pulled his giant greatsword out of its sheath and held it right in front of the ego-item’s throat, "Do not dare speak to grandfather like that."

"Grandfather?" The ego-item asked, and then looked Kiron up and down, simply ignoring the blade held up to his face, "Heh, so that stuck-up geezer finally got to bone someone. Good for him."

"I will not allow you to speak in such a manner about my family. You will-"

"Kiron." Eisen interrupted the half-dragon, who slightly flinched and turned toward his grandfather, who just slightly turned toward him, "Stop it. He has every right to be angry. I completely believe that that is how it happened, after all. Old me surely ’threw him away’ because he was of no use to him. I believe that he, I, was not a good person at times. And I think that’s all there is to it. I can’t apologize enough for doing something like that to you, it’s not anything anyone should experience."

The ego-item stared back at Eisen and looked him up and down, "You’re really not like him at all, and so much like him at the same time." He said, and Eisen slightly laughed in response, "Let’s hope I only embody the good qualities of him then, huh?"

"...let’s see about that." The ego-item said, and then crossed his arms, "I want you to make an item with me. Use me as your tool. I think both of us will then know whether or not it was a good choice that you threw me away or not." He suggested. Eisen didn’t really have to think about it for a long time either, "Alright. That sounds good enough to me. Whatever it is, I���ll let you choose what items you want us to work together to create." The old man replied.

The ego-item simply nodded his head, "Sure. First, we’re making a bottle. We ain’t making anything complex or something. Just a good-ol’ glass bottle, ya hear?"

"Alright. Do you have the materials here?"

"Nope. But I saw ’em in that storage space before."

"Haha, you seem to have pretty good eyes."

"When it comes to the things that matter, yes." The Ego-item replied bluntly as Eisen opened up his item storage. He took a step inside and grabbed the three ingredients he needed, Silica Sand, Soda Ash, and Limestone. Then, Eisen stepped back outside.

"Just a simple bottle, right? No special mix?"

"Right, no special mix." The item replied. Next thing Eisen knew it, the figure of the ego-item turned into any glassblowing equipment that the old man may need. Eisen started pouring the three materials he needed together and mixed them before starting to heat them up. When everything had molten down into the mass of liquid glass that Eisen would need, he grabbed the glassblowing pipe that he would need. The ego-multitool on his apron was rather annoyed, but somehow it kept quiet right now.

And at the same time, an image flowed into Eisen’s head. It was the image of the glass-bottle that the ego-item seemingly wanted Eisen to make with him. It had a relatively simple shape. It was a potion-bottle with a spherical body and a thin neck, although there were pretty shallow indents inside of the glass, forming patterns that Eisen could already use to figure something else out. That the items that the ego-item wanted him to make would end up turning into a large item when combined.

Either way, the old man then simply started to work. The pipe was laying in his hand perfectly, and Eisen and the ego-item were working together in perfect synergy. Any movement that Eisen wanted to make were also those that the ego-item wanted to make, as if they had the exact same thought processes. Eisen would have thought that he would end up working against Eisen, as if trying to sabotage everything, but it seemed like he was just as serious about making items like Eisen was. And that was a great quality to have in Eisen’s opinion.

Once the bottle was done, they moved onto the next part, which was Leathworking. The ego-item turned into knives and needles, and Eisen prepared the materials while it was doing so. Once more, when Eisen touched part of the ego-item, an image flowed into his head. This time, it was something like a ’hull’ for the bottle made with relatively thin glass walls. It would cover every part except those small indents Eisen noticed before.

After the leatherwork was done came blacksmithing, and now the old man had to create parts that would end up going into the spots of the indents created on the bottle instead, to basically cover up the whole bottle on the outside. He didn’t put the metal or leather onto the bottle yet, since it seemed like there was still something missing.

Either way, after he was done with that, Eisen created a small wooden frame-pedestal for the bottle to stand on perfectly. Using tailoring, Eisen created a small net that he had to connect to that pedestal that would then actually hold and stabilize the underside of the bottle.

Then, like Eisen thought, he had to start enchanting things. He carved intricate enchantments on the inside of the leather and the metal parts, which he then finally attached to the bottle. Then, they got to alchemy.

The ego-item actually turned into the whole pot he was supposed to be brewing everything with, and they then created a high-quality potion that Eisen didn’t recognize, pouring it into the bottle they created. And then for the last step, the ego-item handed Eisen a soul stone holding a simple rank 0, blank soul.

Eisen pulled it out like the ego-item told him to, and then pushed it into the top of the bottle. Somehow, although nothing here included soul stones in any way, the soul was kept inside of the liquid, as if suspended in it. And for the last step, the ego-item explained what Eisen had to do by whispering into his ear. The old man groaned slightly and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"What, too bothersome for you?" The ego-item asked, but Eisen just shook his head, "Not really. I just hope I won’t have to do any major crafting today." The old man said. The ego-item turned its arm into a separated knife and handed it to Eisen, who just pushed his finger into the top of the bottle, before cutting through his finger to create a ’cork’ for the bottle.