Rise of the Living Forge - Chapters 235-236 (Patreon)

“You sound awful confident,” Wallace drawled. “Did you forget the part where you had to do this alone? I can’t have someone interfering with this. It’ll taint the purity of the Mithril. Let’s be real with each other. I reckon I’ve gotten a damn good understanding of your lass — she isn’t one to sit around while you’re under threat.”

“Probably not,” Arwin agreed. “But I’m not going to be in any danger, so there won’t be anything for her to be worried about. There’s only going to be an issue if I can’t pull this off.”

“Spoken like a true dwarf,” Wallace said, a smile splitting his beard as he give Arwin a small nod. “Very well. I’ll humor you. Don’t reckon I have a choice, actually. My job’s to get you to properly smith that Mithril. If you need to go back to do that, then back we go. Just remember. You involve the lass — we’re all gonna have a problem.”

The dwarf grabbed his hammer and walked to join Arwin, molten energy heating the tool’s head from within. It quickly turned a brilliant orange and a ripple of power washed out from it as Wallace carved a flaming portal through the air.

Its center rippled and changed to reveal the back room of the Infernal Armory, dark and silent as if in wait. Arwin didn’t waste a second. He stepped through the portal and Wallace followed after him.

The portal snapped shut behind them, sending a small curl of fire through the air before dissipating entirely. Wallace stepped to the side to give Arwin room, bracing his back against the door out and leaning against it.

His meaning was clear enough. He was willing to give Arwin room to work, but he was quite serious about making sure Lillia didn’t interfere. There was a chance that would cause trouble if Lillia arrived before Arwin finished — which meant he didn’t have much time to work with. 

It was difficult to keep the smile from his face. Wallace was too late. The dwarf was worried about Lillia helping him during their little test, but she’d already given Arwin everything he needed to know.

Arwin drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly as he approached the maw-hearth at the center of the room. Wallace’s gaze rested on the back of his neck with enough weight to make his hair stand on end, but he ignored it.

He didn’t care who was watching. It didn’t change anything. After all, he hadn’t found Wallace on his own. The Infernal Armory had opened the portal into the dwarf’s workshop for seemingly no reason.

Now he knew better. That portal hadn’t been random, and it hadn’t just been trying to let him steal some materials to upgrade the smithy. The Infernal Armory wanted to be used. That was its desire — and it didn’t want to just be used by any old smith.

Wallace isn’t the only one testing me here, is he?

“Let’s begin,” Arwin said. “You’re the one that wanted this, aren’t you?”

“Don’t you think you’re missing something?” Wallace asked with a dry laugh. “You need lava if you’re going to do any dwarven smithing. You haven’t forgotten that already, have you?”

“No, I don’t believe I have,” Arwin replied. He approached the maw of the Infernal Armory and placed his hand on its edge. “And I’m afraid I wasn’t talking to you.”

Magical energy tingled against Arwin’s fingers as they ignited with [Soul Flame] and he placed into the maw of the Infernal Armory. He didn’t have any more of Lillia’s food, but they’d already fed it this morning. With any luck, it wouldn’t need another meal so soon and it would still have enough power to —

The veins running throughout the building pulsated. Arwin drew in a surprised breath as the hearth rippled. Petal-shaped stone curled up, flames igniting at their tips and crackling with power.

They closed in on themselves, devouring the fire for an instant. Then the petals pulled back apart. A whump roared out to announce a thick pillar of black flame that burst from the hole in the center of the hearth.

And, for the second time that day, the Infernal Armory opened a portal to Wallace’s workshop. There was just one small difference. This time around, the portal didn’t appear on the obsidian floors.

It formed directly inside the pool of lava.

Magma poured down from the black portal and into the maw of the hearth. It rolled down the petal-shaped walls and into the hole at its center. Light burned within the black veins covering the floor and walls as the lava sank into the Infernal Armory and started to spread through them.

The heart thumped.

“Sorry,” Arwin said, glancing back at Wallace. “This time, it was intentional.”

“Are you stealing my lava?” Wallace demanded.

“Can anyone really own lava? It’s just a hot rock,” Arwin replied with a chuckle. The black portal faded away, but the lava he’d confiscated from the huge pool remained. Petals of the flower-like hearth curled up to form a bowl as the Infernal Armory responded to Arwin’s mental request before he could even make it.

Lava bubbled up inside the bowl and rose to fill it. [Soul Flame] coated Arwin’s hands and he reached in, scooping a small portion free and summoning the magical fire to his mouth as well before popping the lava in and starting to chew.

He ignored the aghast expression on Wallace’s face as he worked to form a ball of lava he could work with. Arwin chewed, pushing his magical energy into the lava as he crushed it beneath his teeth.

The ball of molten stone came together quickly. It wasn’t long before Arwin had it completely prepared and connected to himself. He dismissed the flames from his mouth to save energy, then held the molten ball in one hand as he pulled the steel out and put it within the ball.

He focused his attention, feeling the song of the metal as he purged it of impurities over the next few minutes. After a few minutes of work, he was rewarded with a cube of purified metal ready and waiting to be forged.

Arwin set the metal on the ground and then took the small bar of Mithril out from his pocket. For a second, he hesitated. He’d had a whole lot of practice with the rough steel. This was different.

Warm light reflected off the gentle blue surface of the ingot. Arwin could see his reflection within it, muted and warped in the gentle swirls buried within the metal. From this point onward, he couldn’t afford any mistakes.

He studied the metal for a moment longer. Then he plunged it into the ball of lava. Molten rock swallowed the beautiful blue metal, and Arwin had no more time to contemplate or think.

All he could do now was act.

Thoughts washed across his mind. He blocked them out. The time for the mithril to make its desires known would come, but it wasn’t now. Arwin stilled his breathing. He closed his mind to everything but the beat of the song traveling through the lava cupped in his hands.

He felt it — and it felt him.

Arwin responded to the song, pouring [Soul Flame] into the lava and purging the impurities from the Mithril without mercy. The longer he worked, the more he could feel it harmonizing with him.

His actions were those of the lava, and the lava sung in synchrony with the mithril. Minutes rolled by with the droplets of sweat that traced down Arwin’s brow and soaked into his clothes.

Concentration creased his features and gripped his chest in a vice to the point where he almost forgot to breathe. His focus was completely and utterly on the glowing orange ball of molten stone and the gentle blue metal within it.

And then it was done.

The Mithril was prepared. Arwin pulled it from the ball of lava, a small bar that fit perfectly in the center of his palm and set it down beside the prepared piece of steel. There wasn’t much material, but it was more than enough for what he had planned.

He dropped the ball of lava back into the hole at the center of the hearth. It sank into the stone throat and vanished, sending another flicker of energy through the black veins in the ground.

“Well done,” Wallace said from behind Arwin. “Good purity. I can tell. But what comes next? Have you figured out your dwarven smithing method?”

“Nah. I figured I’d wing it,” Arwin replied with a small smile.

“Good man,” the dwarf cackled. “I knew—”

“But I did lie a little bit,” Arwin said as he drew on his magical energy and let it swirl through his body and gather at his right hand. A tremor ran through the ground at Arwin’s feet and the energy glowing in the black veins pulsated. The heart in the wall thumped.

“Did you, now?” Wallace’s voice held a note of steel in it.

 “I said I wasn’t going to get help. And I won’t. Not from Lillia, at least,” Arwin said. He lifted right hand as the air around it started to shimmer with magical power. “But I’m more than a smith, Wallace. I’m a guildmaster. My power doesn’t come just from working alone. It comes from everyone around me.”

Arwin plunged his hand down into the center of the maw. The stone petals curled shut around his arm in an instant, wrapping it in a surprisingly warm, comforting hug. Another thud passed through the room as the heart beat once more.

An immense wave of thought and desire slammed into Arwin with more intensity than any item he’d ever worked with before. More intensity than all of them put together — but that was no surprise. This was no mere item.

“This is what you wanted, isn’t it?” Arwin asked, baring his teeth in equal parts snarl and smile as power rushed out of him. “Come on!”

The energy stabilized. For a brief instant, the entire building was completely silent.

Then the Infernal Armory came to life.

Chapter 236

Stone rippled along the ground and the walls trembled with delight. A deep thrum rolled through the smithy like an ocean wave and slammed into Arwin. It was at such a low tone that Arwin couldn’t even tell if he’d heard anything, but his teeth rattled in his mouth at its intensity.

He couldn’t even so much as stagger back. The maw of the Infernal Armory still held his arm firmly in place, growing steadily warmer to the touch.

Black light flared from the veins spread throughout the Infernal Armory. Cracks and groans filled the entire smithy and a biting pain bit into Arwin’s trapped arm as something carved into it. Something sharp or strong enough to get through [Indomitable Bulwark].

A second thrum tore through the building. The floor beneath Arwin bucked as a ripple passed beneath it and carried all the way to Wallace, sending the dwarf several stumbling backward amidst a slew of shocked curses.

“What are you doing?” Wallace demanded, planting his feet to keep his balance and raising his hammer before him.

The extruding portion of the wall that held the heart at the back of the smithy split down the center. It pulled apart like the eye of a lizard, revealing a teeming pitch-black mass of thin, ropey strands beneath the stone. They’d wrapped around themselves like a ball of tangled worms.

Three black strands ripped themselves free of the ball and burst out, flashing across the room in a split instant and slamming into Arwin’s captured shoulder. They burrowed into his skin and pulsated, sending ripples of energy running down their length and back into the mass in the wall.

 What the fuck?

Arwin yanked on his arm. It was stuck fast. He drew on [Scourge], preparing to rip it free from the maw regardless of the consequence, when the stone petals pulled apart of their own volition and released him.

The heart beat again. Another tremor shook Arwin and this time he stumbled, nearly losing his balance. His head pounded violently. Stars and darkness flashed before his eyes as he reached for the black veins that the Infernal Armory had pierced him with.

“Finally. You took so long,” a whisper caressed Arwin’s ears like the hiss of a boiling tea kettle. Strands of red mist swirled up from the ground, out from between the cracks in the stone walls, and dripped from the ceiling above.

The mist gathered around him. It rolled out, fleeing to form footsteps tracing the path of an invisible form that stalked through it. The mist coiled to outline flickers of a hand or a leg in passing, but never caught for long enough to give more than a glimpse.

Wallace hadn’t made any moves yet, but he looked one small nudge away from preparing to fight. He stared right past, not having reacted to its arrival in the slightest.

“He can’t see me, Arwin,” the voice said, coming from behind Arwin. A faint force tightened around his left wrist, as if something were holding it. “Don’t pull those out. After all, you did just ask for this. It took a lot of energy to heed your bidding.”

“Who — no. I know who. You’re the Infernal Armory?” Arwin asked, his eyes widening as his grip slackened on the vein. “What do you mean I asked for this? I most certainly did not ask to get stabbed.”

“You plunged your hand into my mouth,” the voice said, a wave of lilting laughter rolling through the building and coiling around Arwin’s head as if it were circling him at the speed of an irate wasp. “Would you have preferred I take your hand instead?”

“Most certainly not,” Arwin admitted. He turned to try to follow the voice but promptly gave up when it became apparent it didn’t have any plans of staying in one place for long. “You… came to help me craft, then? It worked?”

“Don’t sound so surprised. Gather yourself. You’re wasting my energy, and I already have precious little of it. You are the hands. You must act.”

Arwin shoved his confusion away. He could worry about why a damn building was speaking to him in plain words later. Wallace watched Arwin from the corner of the room but, curiously, the dwarf hadn’t said another word.

Maybe this is somewhat normal with dwarven smiths.

“Right. No time to waste. I need to forge Mithril,” Arwin said, grabbing the pieces of metal with his un-stabbed arm and holding them out. “I was thinking—”

“I know what you were thinking. We are connected for a reason. I cannot be your tool if we are of separate minds,” the voice said. The veins connecting to the wall pulsed and a prickling sensation spread through Arwin’s body. “But your goal limits yourself.”

“It does? I rather like it.”

“It can be so much more.” Mist blew past Arwin’s head like it had been caught in a breeze. It coiled over his shoulders and formed a cape behind him before a hand passed through it, destroying its form. “Do what you do best, Arwin. I will be what you need, and you will do what you do best. The world will mold to our desires.”

Arwin opened his mouth to ask what the voice meant, but he caught himself, surprised to realize that he actually knew the answer. A smile pulled across his lips as a new idea struck him.

“Any desires?”

“I do not have enough power for that — but I could. I need more to work with. More food, and more material.”

“Damn,” Arwin said. “I can’t get any more help right now. It’s just us.”

“Us is enough,” the voice whispered. “Have you forgotten about the gift the Mesh gave you? Use the Crag Lizard. I will consume it.”

Arwin hadn’t quite forgotten about the Crag Lizard, but he hadn’t summoned it yet because Lillia still had Wyrmling meat to go through and they didn’t have nearly enough ice boxes to save all of the meat.

That didn’t mean he was keen on using it now. If he fed it to the Infernal Armory, then Lillia would get nothing from their hard work.

“That’s unfair. I’m holding onto it for both of us. I can’t waste it all here.”

“I will leave more than enough. I just need the material,” the voice insisted, a note of urgency entering it. “I will leave half of the meat. Lillia could not possibly cook all of the meat from the Crag Lizard, even if she were to put it into ice boxes.”

Arwin hesitated for a moment longer. Then he nodded and set the metal down on the ground. “Fine. Open up. And remember to leave half, or I’m going to be damn pissed. I’m sure Lillia is nearly out of Wyrmling meat at this point anyway.”

He held a hand over the mouth of the Infernal Armory and sent a mental request to the Mesh.

[Overly Generous] – Awarded for stepping back and letting an ally take the challenge of killing an Overloaded Monster out of desire to see their growth. Power is often found whilst guiding others to it. Effects: A single delivery.  This achievement will be consumed upon your mental request.

Power flared around Arwin’s palm. The Infernal Armory’s maw shot up and closed around it, and a series of loud crunches filled the air. Energy raced down the black veins and the mass in the wall shuddered.

A hiss of pain slipped from Arwin’s lips as the veins connected to his body brightened as well. His skull throbbed and his ears pounded with his heartbeat. Magic poured into his body to fill every muscle to the brim. The red smoke dancing around him grew thicker, and knowledge of exactly what it could do flooded into Arwin’s mind as if he’d always known it.

“Yes. This is our power,” the voice wasn’t whispering anymore. Excitement dripped from its words like a rushing river. “The world will be unmade and reshaped in the image we desire.”

“Give me an anvil,” Arwin growled.

Red mist poured into the stone ground. A tremor shook it as a spike of gray metal jutted up from the ground, expanding as it rose. It folded itself down, transforming into an anvil nearly twice the size of the old, beaten up one he’d had before the smithy had eaten it.

“Scales,” Arwin said.

Two tendrils extended from the mass in the wall. A piece of stone to their side slid open to reveal a pile of huge Crag Lizard scale pieces. The tendrils wrapped around the scales and brought them to the anvil before Arwin. They were easily each several inches thick. The monster’s armor had been incredible. He never would have been able to forge anything like this. Not normally.

Arwin flexed his hand. Verdant Inferno formed in his hands and the veins connected to his shoulder pulsed, pushing even more magical energy into his body. He was practically brimming with it — but the power wasn’t his. He couldn’t feel or interact with the it any more than he could with the magic filling a random monster.

“I’ll go with your suggestion,” Arwin said as he drew deeply on [Scourge], sending the energy flooding into his arms. “I’ll do what I do best. Hit shit hard — but I’m going to need a bigger hammer.”

Stone cracked around Arwin’s feet. Strands of metal raced up his body and twisted around Verdant Inferno’s hilt, cementing themselves around both his hands and the weapon. Black veins leapt from the wall and slammed into the back of the hammer, connecting it with the smithy. It rapidly grew denser, becoming so heavy that he couldn’t have even lifted it without [Scourge].

The veins connected to the hammer lit with burning light as lava raced through them and pumped into the casing covering Verdant Inferno. More red mist sank into the ground and strands of metal rose up, slamming into Arwin’s back one by one to act as supports and counter the hammer’s immense mass. 

Arwin bared his teeth in a mixture of a snarl and a grin. Then, with a roar, he heaved Verdant Blaze into motion. It rose laboriously into the air and hung at its apogee like it bore the weight of a mountain suspended in the sky. Then it pitched forward.

The hammer plummeted down with far more speed than Arwin ever could have mustered on his own. It slammed into the scales with a resounding crash and a shockwave ripped out from the anvil, dust swirling back and tiny pieces of rubble pattering into the walls.

Mist sank into the ground and stone pillars rose up. They moved with unerring fluidity, sliding to bracing against the front of the hammer and lifting it into the air in conjunction with Arwin. They then sank back down as if they’d never been there.

The scales had partially warped together. A haze of heat wavered and danced around them and the acrid scent of hot metal and stone filled the air.

Wallace let a murmured curse slip from his lips, taking a step back as he stared at Arwin with wide, disbelieving eyes, unable to manage a proper sentence.

“You’re not spent, are you?” the voice whispered. Black veins weaved in and out between the walls, snakes swimming through a sea of stone. “We can do so much more than that.”

“Oh, no.” Arwin’s grip on Verdant Inferno’s hilt tightened. “We’ve only gotten started.”