Rise of the Living Forge - Chapter 82 & 83 (Patreon)

I'm not sure if something funky happened on patreon, but there were some chapters released earlier today as well. 

Enjoy!

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CH82:

For the first time in many nights, Arwin slept. The embrace of sleep that had avoided him for so long finally welcomed him back, though it didn’t let him return with grace.

Dreams dug into his mind like the fangs of a Wyrm. Possibilities of what could have been intermixed with the truth of what had been. His words to Reya may have been true, but he wasn’t so sure he believed them himself.

Three of Zeke’s killers were dead. Their death had brought no solace. Jessen still lived, and Arwin still didn’t have a way to kill him. The hunger in Jessen’s eyes – he wanted to crush it.

His resting mind taunted him with the powers that had once been his to command. Just a scant few months ago, Arwin could have killed him with no more difficulty than crushing a Lesser Imp.

And yet, a scant few months ago, Arwin was alone. He would have had no reason to kill Jessen. He would have had nothing to lose. A guardian with nothing to protect aside from the distant memory of an ideal that he’d clutched onto ever since he’d arrived in this world.

The only people that he’d truly desired to save were already dead.

A strand of amusement passed through Arwin’s dreams like a swirl of paint through water. In losing his powers, he’d finally found rediscovered a reason to have them. The haunting dreams started to falter. They shrank before the growing determination that took hold in his mind.

Revenge would be had, but not at the cost of their lives. Zeke was gone. More death would not let him rest easier. The only thing that could ever give his loss meaning was life. Jessen had to be stopped to keep others from meeting the same fate, but Arwin wasn’t strong enough to protect everyone.

And, for the first time, he was truly fine with that. Arwin didn’t have to be strong enough to protect everyone. He just had to be strong enough to protect the people around him.

Only once he could do that would Arwin allow himself to desire more. His eyes drifted open and the dreams shattered before the light of day. Sunlight filtered through the dirty window of Arwin’s room and onto his pillow.

Arwin’s face felt warm. The temptation to lie in bed and let the world pass him by tried to pull at him, but its call fell on deaf ears. There was too much to do. He rose and strode out of the room. Stairs creaked beneath his weight as he headed down to the tavern.

Lillia poked her head out of the kitchen. The light from the lantern just barely illuminated her form.

“You slept?”

“For once,” Arwin said. “You?”

“For once,” Lillia said, a note of amusement tinging her voice. “What now? We throw ourselves into finding a way to kill Jessen?”

“It’s tempting,” Arwin admitted. He would have loved to do just that. It was definitely what Jessen expected. Another vision of Jessen’s eyes passed through his mind, and a grin pulled at Arwin’s lips. “But no. That’s not what we’re doing.”

“What? Why not?” Lillia asked.

“Because there’s only one way to beat someone like this,” Arwin replied. “And it isn’t by playing their game. You got a read on him, didn’t you? Jessen wants us to try him again. He thinks we’ll come knocking at his door with some scheme.”

“Is that not what we were going to do?” Lillia her hands off on her clothes. They left small streaks of flour behind like the stripes of a tiger. “You can’t mean we’re just going to ignore him.”

“We try to do anything to undermine Jessen directly, and we lose,” Arwin said. “He’s too powerful to take in a direct fight. The moment we try to do anything against him is when he’ll show up with a new game to play.”

“Probably,” Lillia said, crossing her arms and leaning against the doorframe. “You’re saying we drive him insane by just… forgetting about him?”

“By living as if he isn’t even there,” Arwin corrected. “We don’t forget. But Jessen is going to go insane trying to figure out how we’re planning to take him out. He wants to crush us for what we did. I’d wager a bet that he’s also convinced we feel the same toward him.”

“We do.”

“We do.” Arwin nodded. “Which is why he’ll be confident we’re trying something. He’ll spend resources and energy trying to find out what it is. The longer it takes, the more confused and worried he’ll get. He won’t approach us, though. That would be another defeat.”

“You think he’s just going to lose his shit because we do nothing?” Lillia asked doubtfully.

“I think it’ll make him squirm. And, even if it doesn’t, we’ll still be stronger. Jessen will be able to do nothing but watch as we become powerful. He loses the moment he so much as says a word to us.”

A grin crawled across Lillia’s face and she nodded. “I think I see what you’re getting at. We win either way. He won’t be able to handle the fact that we’re just ignoring him. While we focus on ourselves, he focuses on us.”

“Right. Even if he does just ignore us, I’m confident we’ll grow powerful faster than he will. We’ve already seen the path to take and learned what steps to avoid. He hasn’t. Both paths lead to victory.”

“If you’re going to go with this, you’ll need to explain it to the others,” Lillia said. “Reya isn’t going to take it well. She still wants to act.”

“I’ll speak with her,” Arwin said. “It’s not an easy request to make. A large part of me wants to just sprint at Jessen and rip him apart with my bare hands, even though I know that’s going to end with getting myself killed. Reya isn’t stupid. She’ll come around.”

“Then I’ll let Rodrick and Anna know. Are you heading out?”

“Yes. I need to occupy myself. The best way to do that will be trying to return to normal. I’m going to start rebuilding the smithy.”

“You’re not choosing a new building?”

“No. I’m not going to let Jessen take the smithy from me. That’s the spot I chose, and that’s the spot I’ll keep.”

“That’s understandable. I don’t think I’d be willing to swap buildings for the tavern either,” Lillia said. She pushed away from the doorframe and gave Arwin a small smile. “I’ll send Reya your way when she wakes up. Just remember you don’t have to bear all the weight of this on your own.”

“I know. Thank you, Lillia.”

Lillia nodded and turned back to the kitchen. She her work to do, and Arwin had his. He headed out of the tavern. Bright sunlight fell down on him the instant he stepped out of the door. It took his eyes a moment to adjust.

The longer I spend in the dark, the more comfortable I get in it. I wonder if that speaks more to me or the tavern.

Arwin blinked the brightness away and headed off down the street. He came to a stop at the edge of the burnt block that had once been his smithy. A certain sense of irony struck him. Everything was covered in a layer of ash, black as night. He’d left the darkness of the tavern only to find even more of it outside in the light.

Even though the wind had carried a lot of the ash away, there were still small piles against the remains of the walls and strewn across the ground. It felt like there was no end to it.

I suppose there won’t be until I get started. Can’t get anywhere without taking the first steps, even if you’re taking them for the second time.

Arwin knelt by the ash and scooped it up. He walked over to the ditch behind the smithy. To his surprise, he couldn’t see the bodies of the Brothers Six in it. He tilted his head to the side, the pile of ash in his palms starting to blow away in the wind.

Eh. Who cares what happened to them. Maybe a large stray animal got hungry.

He glanced at the ash. There were probably better ways to dispose of it than dumping it into a hole. Then again, Arwin was pretty sure that ash was good for the dirt. It was a fertilizer. Maybe they could start a garden for Lillia.

Arwin let the handful fall. It twisted and swirled through the air on its way down like it was trying to paint a picture. As to what the picture was, Arwin was unsure. He got the feeling he’d figure it out in time.

Ch83: 

Arwin’s world was soot and blackened brick. His fingernails were packed with dirt and his fingers ached from working pieces of broken stone out of the rubble. Power trickled through his body as he activated [Scourge] and slung a burnt beam over his shoulder.

He walked down a path strewn with small pieces of rubble and specs of ash. His feet remembered the path back to the ditch better than his mind did. Arriving at the edge, Arwin threw the piece of wood into a growing pile at the ditch’s bottom.

It landed vertically, impaling the pile of soot and rock like the sword of a long-forgotten king that awaited a hero to draw it free. Arwin trudged back to the site of his smithy and picked up the largest stone he could find.

He brought it back over to the ditch and tossed it. The rock landed on the brittle piece of protruding wood, shattering it and sending splinters everywhere. Arwin nodded to himself and turned to return.

The last few hours had been productive. He’d drained most of the power he had using [Scourge] to lug chunks away from the smithy. The majority of the ground had been cleared away and all that remained were a few last stragglers.

Arwin wiped his brow. His hand left behind a black streak of dirt that mixed with the rivulets of sweat running down his face and stinging his eyes. Cursing under his breath, Arwin wiped at his face with his shirt. That only succeeded in smearing everything around and annoying him even further.

He gave up and let his hands drop. There were still more rocks to move. He could clean himself up after he finished his work for the day. If he’d had more energy, it would have only taken another hour at most. He wasn’t so lucky.

Even though Arwin had been rationing his energy, there was only so much power in his body. [Scourge] was a power-hungry ability that didn’t lend itself well to usage over long periods of time. He’d been using it to break up all the damaged stone into manageable chunks and carry them for hours. Now there was nothing but his own dwindling strength left.

Arwin crouched beside a stone that had fallen at an angle and wedged itself into the ground. He dug his fingers into the dirt beside it. It pressed against the beds of his fingernails and the sharp rock dug into his palms as he heaved.

Dirt shifted and he pulled the stone free with a groan. Arwin pulled it against his chest and gritted his teeth. The rock didn’t seem happy with its relocation. It fought to slip free of his grasp with every ponderous step he took. Arwin finally reached the ditch and let his weary hands relax. The stone thudded down the side and collided with another rock at the bottom, shattering into a dozen pieces.

Heaving a sigh, Arwin headed back to the smithy. He picked out his next target – half of a large slab that he suspected had once been part of his former hearth – and mentally prepared himself to pick up another piece.

As he went to pick it up, he caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. Arwin raised his gaze. Standing across the street from him was a figure made blurry by the sweat and dirt nipping at Arwin’s eyes.

He wiped his face with the inside of his shirt and stood up. It didn’t make sense for Jessen to have broken his word already. Arwin had been confident he’d gotten a good read on the man.

His attempts to wipe his eyes were largely ineffective, but they still did enough to let him make out more detail. The man across from him wore the clothes of a beggar. Dirt and grime stained his entire body and had worked its way so deeply into his white beard that it almost looked brown. He held a ratty old mug in one hand and supported himself with the other.

“Can I help you?” Arwin asked.

The other man swayed in place. His eyes shifted from Arwin to the mug in his hand and then back again. He seemingly lost an internal battle and lifted the mug to his lips to take a long drink from it.

Belching, the man lowered the mug and wiped his mouth with the back of a sleeve. A second of silence passed before he spoke with the sheer confidence that only a fool or a drunkard could muster. “No.”

“This isn’t a show. Feel free to move on,” Arwin said. He wasn’t all too keen on letting someone stand around behind him. Appearances could be deceiving – and even a drunkard could run him through if he wasn’t paying attention.

“What, do you own the street?” The man hiccupped and took another sip from his mug. “I ain’t doing anything. No need to be prickly. You and I don’t seem so different from how I see it.”

Arwin looked down at his hands. It was hard to argue with the drunkard’s observation. His palms told the story of a man who still hadn’t figured out that bathing was an activity that was meant to be done more than once a year.

“I suppose I can’t argue too much with that,” Arwin admitted. He picked out a large rock with a flat top and sat down on it. A point the man may have had, but Arwin didn’t want to find a different point going through his back. “If you’re going to stand around, you may as well sit. I assume you want something.”

The drunkard chuckled. He stumbled over to Arwin. Several times he tripped over his feet and took several stumbling steps forward. By some miracle, he managed to make it over to another large stone without tripping and breaking his neck.

“Why you digging through the ash?” the man asked as he sat. His momentum took him just a little too far. All his efforts in arriving to the stone safely were wasted as he pitched back. His legs flew up as he slid off the stone and landed on the ground back-first with a loud thump. For a second, the man’s legs remained pointed straight into the air. Then they flopped down over the rock and he lifted his mug. He’d managed to avoid spilling it on the way down.

“You okay?” Arwin asked, trying to keep the amusement from his tone.

“Was just ‘sittin. There’s nothing in the ruins worth taking. You’re just wasting your time.”

“I’m not looking to take anything.”

“Then what are you bothering with?” the man gestured vaguely with his mug. “There are other buildings here.”

“There are,” Arwin agreed. “But I like this one.”

“How? There’s nothing left to like.” The man chuckled to himself and raised the mug over his head, pouring the last of his drink out like the world’s most pathetic waterfall. The majority of it missed his mouth and landed on his face. He let out a slew of waterlogged curses.

“It’s not about how much is left. It’s about what you do with it,” Arwin said. He braced his arms against his knees and leaned forward to rest. “It’ll be worth it once everything is rebuilt. It’ll be my smithy, not just a building I confiscated.”

“Until someone blows it up again.”

Arwin ran a hand through the thin layer of soot remaining on the ground and rubbed it between his fingers. It wasn’t like he could get any more stained.

“It’s an interesting thought, isn’t it?”

“What is?”

“Is it better to have had something and lose it or to never have had it at all?”

“Can’t get hurt if you don’t have anything to lose.”

“Can’t live if you don’t have anything to live for,” Arwin countered.

“Sure. Keep telling yourself that as you pick through the remains of your life,” the drunkard said with a chuckle. He pushed himself upright and teetered unsteadily on the top of his rock. “Care for any more ash with that ash?”

Arwin didn’t take the bait. It was obvious the man was trying to goad him into a fight. It wasn’t going to work. He stood in the remains of his old smithy and the dreams of his next. There was nothing he could do to take back the past. That didn’t mean he was going to let it destroy his future.

“Can you really say that if you don’t even have anything to lose?” Arwin asked.

Amber light poked into Arwin’s eyes as the sun started to dip behind Milten’s skyline. It cast the city in burnt oranges and yellows. Light shimmered off the cracks in the stones that were unmarred by soot, reminding Arwin that he still had more to do before the day was done.

He braced his hands against his knees and rose to his feet. Some of his energy had returned. It wasn’t much, but it would be enough to finish what he’d started.

“I’ve got all I need,” the drunkard said. He shook his empty tankard at Arwin, then paused and glanced inside it.

“If you’re sure,” Arwin said noncommittally. “I’m not going to tell you how to live your life. I might suggest you get another refill from Lillia, though.”

“What makes you think I get my drinks anywhere here?”

“She mentioned a raggedy bloke that got drinks from her. It wasn’t hard to make the connection.” Arwin crouched beside a rock, still facing the nameless drunkard, and activated [Scourge]. He lifted it into the air and trudged over to the ditch to dispose of it. The drunkard made no move to follow Arwin, but he was still there when he returned.

“Aren’t you worried that you’ll lose more?"

“Perhaps I will, but I’ll do everything in my power to protect it. I can’t predict the future and I can’t change the past. All I can do is live in a way that hopefully does right by everyone – both living and dead.”

Arwin picked up another rock and set off to the ditch.

When he got back, the drunkard was gone. Arwin only paused for long enough to make sure the man wasn’t hiding somewhere and waiting to stab him. The man had seemed far more curious than aggressive, but that wasn’t a reason to skip out on precautions.

It looked like he had well and truly left. Arwin considered heading to Lillia’s tavern to look for him but dismissed the idea. The conversation had ended. Arwin hadn’t even gotten the man’s name.

Ah, well. I imagine I’ll see him around again. I’m pretty sure that’s literally the only other person on this street. He’s probably filling back up on booze with Lillia right now. With how sloshed he already was, it probably won’t be long until he’s passed out in an alleyway somewhere.

Arwin turned his attention back to the smithy. The grace of the sun was fading fast. Orange had turned to a vibrant gossamer pink intertwined with streaks of red in the final show of daylight before the night could claim the sky.

I’m finishing this before I go to bed tonight.