Far to the south, where warm currents of the sea surround scattered palm-tree islands, down in the depths, where rainbow-colored coral reefs cover the seabed, lives a colony of undersea-walkers. However, very little is known about these undersea-walkers, as they hardly ever set foot on the coral reefs. According to some evil mouths, they are not really people anymore, but half-fish. This is of course just a rumor, but it is undeniable that the undersea-walkers of the southern seas live in a harmony with aquatic life that most places would not even dream of.
Hundreds of years ago, a certain brown-haired boy was born into this wonderland surrounded by the sea, a boy who was given the name Matthias. The youngest Mullen child was initially just like any other undersea-walker offspring. The first time it was noticed that something was wrong with him was when he began to squint. The healers could not say anything, they had no idea what disease the child's eyes could have.
Matthias could still see colors at that time. He knew that the sea was blue, that the corals were red, yellow, green, and pink, but as he grew older, the colors became fainter and fainter. When he was six years old, he could still see the world around him, although only in gray with thin outlines around the people. However this year was important to him. This year, his father took him with himself when he went on a trading trip to the mainland.
You could say that this trip was the work of fate. Little Matthias found his life's purpose. It was all a pure coincidence, his father was talking to a vendor about selling him his rare sea animal wares, when Matthias saw something across the street that he had never seen before in his life. A stocky old man was standing behind a large piece of stone and brandishing a huge hammer. Matthias stared open-mouthed as the man worked, as the iron bar turned into a weapon under his hand, as sparks flew everywhere, as the water sizzled when the man pressed the iron into it.
"It's not healthy to look directly into the fire, young man, it burns your eyes." The stocky man turned to him with a kind smile.
"I'm going to get blind anyway." Matthias grimaced, which made the man look at him in confusion.
"You better be careful eitherway." He squatted down in front of him. "Are you interested?" He nodded towards the weapon glowing in the fire, and Matthias started nodding vigorously. "You know what. You can hit it." The man chuckled and ruffled the boy's hair as he stood up and took the iron out of the fire, then placed it on the anvil and picked up a smaller hammer with his free hand, which he held towards Matthias.
The young boy took the tool with a serious face and, trying to copy the man's movements exactly, raised the hammer above his head with one hand and hit the iron. His face immediately broke into a huge smile, his eyes, which always stared at the world with a pale blue, almost sparkled. His heart was filled with happiness and he didn't even think when he hit the iron a little harder to straighten it.
"Look at that, someone has a knack for hammers." The stocky blacksmith laughed as he took the hammer back from Matthias.
"Will you teach me how to make such things?" The little boy asked enthusiastically, as he pointed to the weapons hung on the wall of the blacksmith shop.
"It's been a long time since I've seen such enthusiasm. You can be my apprentice." He ruffled the little boy's hair again.
"Matthias!" At his father's voice, the smile melted from the boy's face. "What are you doing here? Forgive me, I thought I lost him. It's time for us to go, Matthias." He grabbed the boy's shoulder.
"But the kind man promised to teach me how to do such things!" Matthias' eyes welled up with tears as he pointed to the weapons. His father's gaze darkened, however.
"We'll talk about this at home. Goodbye, sir." He said goodbye to the blacksmith and dragged little Matthias towards the sea.
However, that particular conversation only happened when they were already home and it wasn't so much a conversation as a hearty scolding. Undersea-walkers don't use metal weapons, the sea and the waters are weapons enough for those who can control them. So Matthias was told that he could never set foot in the forge again and that he shouldn't even think about contradicting his parents.
Little Matthias didn't object, he nodded like a clever child and returned to his room. No one had to know that he had no intention of staying away from the forge. As soon as he had the opportunity in the evening, he ran away to the seaside town to learn from the hunchbacked man, and by morning he was home as if he had never left. And he repeated this journey every other evening. He wanted to absorb as much knowledge as possible as soon as possible. He didn't know how long he had before he lost his eyesight. Nor how long he could escape from home unnoticed.
The answer to this question was six years. Matthias had been able to do so until now. To escape so that they wouldn't notice. By now, he had learned almost everything from the blacksmith on the beach, who had already joked that Matthias would become a better blacksmith than he ever was, despite the fact that he couldn't see. Because up until now, little Matthias had only seen blackness in the world, the gray shapes had disappeared and only the colorful outlines of energies remained before him.
Like so many things in the boy's life, his discovery was due to pure chance. That evening, everything went as usual, Matthias ran away to the beach and returned to the coral reef at dawn. However, as he was heading towards their house, he suddenly became aware of sounds around him. He barely had time to realize that something was wrong when colorful energy outlines surrounded him.
Matthias has never fondly remembered that day since. He knew he was breaking the rules by running away from the reef, the southern undersea-walkers didn't like it when their people left the reef, but he didn't expect the situation to get this bad.
The undersea-walker colony had almost cursed him away from the reef, and what hurt young Matthias the most was that his father was behind it all, who had noticed that he had disappeared. His mother didn't even turn to him when the boy with his tear-stained face was expelled from the undersea-walker city.
Young Matthias truly grew up that day. He cried all his tears and has only shed tears once since, on his wedding day. There, at the bottom of the sea in front of the reef that was his home, he vowed never to be weak again. He turned his back on the southern undersea-walker colony and didn't look back as he left the sea.
The blacksmith he had previously trained with had offered to send him to study with another master who was skilled in forging objects imbued with soul magic. Matthias had been undecided about what to do with the offer, but now his home had made its decision for him. So the young blacksmith took the world upon himself to begin his apprenticeship.