Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

--- Minas Mar, Embassy---

“How are the last preparations for the games going?” Mary asked at the orb. Inside the orbs, it showed Cade, Karina, and the members of Yulecat's Fur who were currently at Little Gamma to test and oversee the venue. Apart from Mary, Jane, Leana, and Luf were also present.

Their plans had changed a little over the past weeks. Minas Mar decided to open the games to anyone, this included demons, cultivators, and players from other worlds. This opened the door for the infiltration by potential enemies. Even their own people may have designs to disrupt the festivity.

To prevent this as best as possible, they had to slightly change the venues. The Stadium was already built at the edge of Little Gamma while the other venues were prepared outside. Last-minute changes included the growth of a new city district. The Pythian Village was adjoined to the stadium and outside Little Gamma's main barrier.

Of course, this came with a rat tail of more things to do. After Karina grew the buildings, they had to be equipped with utilities, and the district was secured by a secondary barrier to ensure the safety of the participants. Despite that, it was the best way to prevent a random number of people from infiltrating their city.

“The technicians are still working on installing magic devices for water and heat in some of the buildings, but the secondary barrier is stable and we are mostly done. Just in time, I have to say. People wishing to enter the tournament have already started appearing. Especially cultivators, how did they find out so quickly?”

“Yeah, they also started appearing here, too” Mary agreed.

It was one thing for people from Chrona's many worlds to arrive on Urth, since they were putting quite the money in advertising it even outside. Since they were broadcasting on almost all possible ways of technology on Urth, it was also no wonder that many natives appeared from the woodwork.

But since the announcement of the tournament that included contests of power, skill, and art, the presence of Cultivators had also sharply risen. It was inconclusive whether this was the late arrival of the wave Master Mountain had prophesied and heard about it upon arrival from travelers, or they had heard about the tournament and started flogging to the cities now.

Mary heard various reports from the walls around Delta, that people walking on air would appear to haughtily ask whether this was little Gamma, followed by asking for directions to find it. Quite a few also managed to talk their way past the guards from Chrona and enter Delta to roam the streets.

“How is Delta faring? We put them into the Pythian Village, but those guys have no chill. They are constantly fighting for some made-up reasons,” Cade complained exasperated. It was like looking at a group of trigger-happy drunkards who were just looking for a reason to fight. Mary sighed.

“Just yesterday cultivator attacked a player because “he looked at me weird”. He proceeded to destroy two buildings fighting the players and city guards before he was caught and under control.

These guys are really problematic.”

Apart from their behavior, their skills also made it hard for the people of the system to put them under control because they had diverse sets of skills. Someone who was fighting with the sword the whole time may suddenly use abilities that closer resembled an assassin and escape in the last moment. Or magicians that suddenly used melee weapons.

“ Luckily, most of them quickly leave for Little Gamma.”

“Yeah, great news for us...” Cade mumbled. At least they were able to contain them to the Pythian Village.

…

---Y-City---

“Could you repeat that in slow? I understood about half of what you just said,” Seth asked him to repeat.

“Dig Dimblood, a shame to the trade. Wickedly talented, but evil me say. Evil to the core and does anything for his gold. No integrity at all. Like's to play lethal pranks on people like yous. A green-robed menace.”

The red little man kept talking himself into a frenzy as he cursed at Dig Dimblood. What Seth got out of this was that the creature was in a similar class as Forebone, but unlike the drunk shoemaker, the other was greedy for gold, a sadist, and an untalented cobbler who ruined the reputation of their guild.

“It's be best yous stay away from the northwests of this place. Dimblood and some of his cronies created theirs court there,” Strik finished, when he finally started losing energy. At some point during his tirade he started drinking, and it seemed the alcohol slowly kicked in.

“Their court?” Seth asked a little confused. However, Forebone's head had already slammed off the workbench he had been sitting on. A slow snoring started sounding in the workshop. Seth rubbed his temples, listening to the drunk little man who had been a bigger burden than expected.

The blacksmith left him a business card and a short message before leaving. He would have liked to recruit Strik, but he didn't really get a chance to talk about it. Although it was straining to talk with him, he preferred this over meeting with Uno and Tearlach.

He still saw them as a threat of triggering some annoying quest. He only became more assured, hearing about their battle with the Tuatha De. Those two had a past and he was not interested in hearing of it. Stepping out, he looked around, it was night outside.

“We continue moving, just stay out of this house,” he announced, pointing at the place Strik was sleeping in. They were on a tight schedule and he had lost quite some time talking with the shoemaker.

Although Strik's description sounded promising, Seth wanted to hurry and loot the other three locations, so he could return to meet with Mike. Once those places were secured, the blacksmith would take as much as he could back, leaving the clean-up of the outskirts to the golems. Mostly to the elites, who had enough time and self-awareness to memorize Seth's announcement and lead the golems without him there.

From this outermost point, Seth and the golems made their way closer to the center. The closer they got to the massive horns of Lezzekai looming in the distance, the quieter the city became. Not many beasts dared get close to the sleeping field boss. Seth and the golems, too, became quieter and snuck to the last place, rather than looting their way there.

They only picked what was readily available until they reached the player association's headquarters. This was the place where the Polyarkanate Armors were developed. Payle Cormac and many other craftsmen had once worked here and most of their products were stored here.

It was the most prominent location and the only reason they had hope to find anything was because this place was incredibly close to Lezzekai. The ground under their feed was literally shaking from the boss's heartbeat and gentle breathing.

Seth left most of the golems behind at the last location, taking only a few hundred with him. Enough to empty the place. According to Baker's memories, they should always be a minimum stock of 500 epics and 1000 rare armors in the association.

The blacksmith doubted the Scene would have kept to this directive, but it didn't hurt to take a look. He already had enough overall Polyarkanate Armors for all of the golems. But he didn't mind it if the portion of epic armors was higher.

…

Seth took a deep breath.

“It's empty.” Sivri summed up the current situation.

It was as the golden dwarf had stated, the most promising location was completely empty. Someone had taken everything, not even empty boxes were left. Not only the storage was emptied, but there were clearly places where crafting stations like furnaces, anvils, sewing machines, looms, and so on had been standing at some point. Everything was taken.

“Do you think someone came here before us?” she asked, curiously checking out the empty rooms.

“Obviously the question is whether the Scene relocated this place even before we fought them, or someone did it afterward. No matter what, it's suspicious.”

It had to be the work of an insider, since all doors that needed password codes, stood wide open when they came in. If it really was someone afterward, it had to be a remnant of the Scene, a simple craftsman probably would not know these codes. The one thing speaking against that was the lack of corpses.

The building was clean, which meant that there was nobody inside during Seth's fight with the scene. The scene had sacrificed normal people using monsters and soldiers to kill them. This was not 100%, but at least he had some hope that there were no remnants of the Scene out there.

“..Let's leave. There is nothing left for us here.”

The blacksmith finally said and left. The objective was more or less fulfilled, it was time to meet Mike.