After he finished the bowl of stew, he focused on Mittelt. He studied the small woman for a little while before he spoke up, "I have you to thank for saving my life, right?"
Mittelt nodded, "That's right. I was the nearest member of the Grigori when you triggered the alert. I got there just in time to finish off that stray."
Junichiro shuddered at the mention of the stray. He didn't want to think of that monster eating his arm right in front of him. He swallowed before speaking with a thick voice, "Thank you for saving me."
Mittelt shrugged her shoulders, "It was no big deal. The damage you dealt to her left her pretty weak. She probably would have died from her wounds anyway."
Junichiro nodded before a thought occurred to him, "How did you all not know she was there?"
The question was asked with a hint of suspicion and narrowed eyes. Mittelt, luckily, had a truthful answer to give him, "She wasn't at that location when the area was last checked. I can honestly say she was nowhere near this house."
Junichiro looked over her closely, trying to tell if she was lying or not. It didn't help that Mittelt was actually being completely truthful. After a while, he gave up trying to tell. Mittelt might be among the weakest of Fallen Angels, but she was still at least a millennium old. Even if all the years of his past life were counted, he only had around sixty to seventy years of experience. His Artificer knowledge simply didn't count for that kind of thing.
In that moment he decided to make an item that could detect when people were lying, "Fine. So you'll be sticking around for a while right? In that case, I would appreciate some help from you in the workshop."
Mittelt scoffed, "Don't expect too much from me. I don't know anything about making stuff like you and Azazel-sama do."
"That's fine, as long as you can lend a hand until I can do it all myself, it will be enough."
Mittelt's lips twitched a bit at his statement, though she managed to not outright laugh at him for the hand comment, "Fine. Azazel-sama left me here to help out, so I'll do so until he tells me otherwise." She gave him a level look, "Just remember who my real boss is and don't get ahead of yourself, got it?"
Junichiro nodded in understanding. He definitely wasn't her boss, hell he wasn't even taller than her at the moment. Though he wondered where that irrelevant thought came from. He left the conversation there and got himself a second bowl of the delicious thick stew. As he did, Mittelt called out, "Don't expect me to do all the cooking either. I only did so today as a special exception. I'll only cook when I feel like it."
As he sat down, he eyed Mittelt, "How about we take turns with it? Rather than cooking our own dinner meals we switch off each day and cook enough for the both of us. Then whoever isn't cooking does the dishes for the day?" He waved at the kitchen, "Luckily, there's a dishwasher so it wont be too much effort to do that."
Mittelt seemed to ponder that for a moment before speaking, "So, dishes are your job tonight. Tomorrow you'll cook dinner and I'll take care of the dishes?"
He nodded in reply, "Yup. We'll take care of our own breakfast and lunch meals. Deal?"
Mittelt stuck her hand out, "Deal."
Junichiro reached out with his right hand without thinking, before stopping and sighing. He Quickly swapped hands and exchanged and awkward handshake with Mittelt as he used his left to shake her right. He would take care of the dishes after he finished his dinner.
The following day, Junichiro returned to the workshop after making breakfast for himself. Doing so with the limited mobility of his new hand was strange, but he was slowly getting used to the difference. Eventually he knew he would have a hand as good as, if not better than, his original. He just needed more experience, mana, and proper materials.
For now, he was back to work on the Mana Steel he'd worked on the previous day. He'd decided what he wanted to make out of it during his morning shower. He was going to make a large, at least forty centimeters, long drop point Bowie knife. Bowie's were pretty good all around knives that could be used as easily for working as for fighting or hunting. Being of such a large size it would also be bordering on short sword territory making it a rather impressive weapon.
Bowie knives weren't as popular in Japan as a Tanto might have been, but this would be for his personal use and not something for sale. The first thing he planned to make to sell was going to be a kitchen knife set. If it aint broke don't fix it right? If he could sell that full set he'd make a decent profit and be able to get his hands on more Mana Steel. Round and round it would go, such was the grind at the core of being a good Artificer!
Working the steel made the time fly and it wasn't until a little after lunch that he was finished with the blade, quenching it in what was apparently a blessed oil, and was ready to move onto the handle. He decided to use a left over piece of the magical Ironwood that now made up his right arm. There were plenty of scraps left after making the arm so he had enough to work with. Since the blade was a full tang construction, he just needed to make a nice pair of scales the sandwich the tang with.
It didn't take him long to prepare and rough shape the scales. The problem came when it was time to drill a few holes through the tang of the blade so he could add some pins to secure the scales. It turned out that Mana Steel, even without being hardened, was strong enough to break Tungsten Carbide drill bits. After breaking two, he decided to try something different. A drill bit was a tool right? So...