Weapons

The Levin Sword throws lightning and reaches two squares as happily as one, which means a single unit covers both melee and ranged without swapping weapons. It is among the strongest things you can carry in Fire Emblem Engage, and the game offers four separate ways to get one. They are not equally good, and the difference is large enough to plan around.

The first route is the one to take, and it is easy to walk past. Chapter 12 has a Corrupted Sword Master at the southern end of the map who is not on the critical path, and defeating him hands the sword over at the end of the battle. If you clear the objective without going south, you lose the free copy and the next one costs 3,000 gold three chapters later.

The upgrade table, and the thing it tells you

Once you have one, the Smithy will improve it. The base weapon is 13 Might, 85 Hit, 11 Weight, range 1 to 2, and the first three upgrades read like this.

Add the gold column and taking one Levin Sword from base to +3 costs 5,000 gold and 260 Iron. Buying a whole second Levin Sword at the Armory costs 3,000. So the third upgrade alone costs exactly as much as a fresh weapon, and the full climb to +3 costs more than buying two.

That is not an argument against forging, because a +3 sword is better than two base ones in the hands of a single unit. It is an argument for deciding early who is holding it, since spreading the investment across two swords wastes the free copy you were given in chapter 12.

Why the last route is on the list at all

Upgrading a plain steel sword until it becomes a Levin Sword takes roughly seven upgrades and our page recommends against it in plain terms, calling it ridiculously resource intensive. It is included because of one specific situation: if you have already been pouring materials into a steel sword and it is in active use, finishing the chain salvages that investment rather than abandoning it.

Otherwise the ranking is simple. Take the chapter 12 drop. If you missed it, save 3,000 gold and buy one at chapter 15. Treat enemy drops as a bonus rather than a plan, since the green icon only marks that an enemy carries something, not what. Our forging guide covers the Smithy in general, and the weapon triangle explains why a sword that also works at range is worth this much attention in the first place.

One last note on who should carry it. A Levin Sword rewards a unit who can use both halves of its range, so it is wasted on a pure melee bruiser who will never stand two squares away. Our best classes guide is the place to check whether the unit you have in mind can actually take advantage of it.