Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

After Seth had understood the process of producing the vessel in all its details, he was ready to start the actual work. He was quite confident to be able to pull it off with a normal material.

The problem was Al's insistence on using the body of Lehaliphon, the throne she had hunted, as the materials for her body. Like the body of the angel he had forged, it was not a material recognized by the system.

This made it much harder for him to use it, as he had gotten used to knowing everything about a metal when he looked at it. The absence of this information made him feel as if he had gone blind in one eye.

In conclusion, not being able to appraise it also meant the material was not in his material catalog, which meant he was also unable to use it in blueprinting, and he could not use the system guidance of <Blueprint>.

Although it felt awkward, it didn't mean that he couldn't do it! He just had to trust his experience and skill.

He took out the body of the angel the sorceress had roughed up. From the outside, it looked like a heap of metallic feathers and eyes. However, when he started dismantling the whole thing its horrific body came to light.

Below the majestic-looking feathers were thick fleshy tentacles, covered in eyes. The body from which these tentacles grew was a facetted sphere with an eye on every facet. There were no orifices at all.

It looked very disconcerting and alien once the feathers were plucked off.

The next step was turning it all into a usable shape. Using <Pyrokinesis> like a plasma cutter, Seth dismembered the eldritch horror into sizable pieces before bringing it all to his furnace.

For the first time, Seth could really feel the changes that <Kin of Fire> brought with it. During the journey or fights, he never had the time to really concentrate on it. In the quiet environment of his workshop, with only the roaring of the furnacing in front of him, he could finally explore the change.

In this quiet moment, he could feel a deep connection with the flame in front of him. Deeper than when he had just contracted it. It was a tangible bond, and he could feel the warmth and goodwill the spirit flame had towards him.

The lack of system assistance in working with the divine metal further deepened this impression. He did not need the system windows and controls of the smelter anymore. He also didn't have to blindly trust into the color of the flame or the metal inside.

Seth was able to precisely feel the change within the furnace as if they were part of his body. The temperature of the flame, the heat of the metal. And as he intimately kept interacting with the fire, he felt this bond strengthening.

Unlike with <Pyrokinesis> which was mostly grasping and manipulating the shape of fire, it was much more like a communication.

It was not measured by levels or other system metrics anymore, but Seth could feel it improving. As long as he kept getting used to it, he might be able to fuse it with <Pyrokinesis>, his combat prowess would increase a lot. The deeper the bond, the easier it would become to call upon it in a sudden situation, without using magic.

Despite missing the system assistance, he was able to precisely detect when the metal liquified and when to pour it into the casting molds. It had something meditative, and it helped Seth finally, truly calm down after reading that letter.

But it was more. He felt a pressure lifting from him he had not realized existed. It took him a while of sitting in silence until he realized that it was probably the aftereffect of <Calm Reaction>.

Even though he had thought he had gotten through the past weeks quite well, it was mostly thanks to this skill, that he did not fall into a panic every 30 minutes. Now, in his meditation with the flame, these aftereffects dissipated.

Without him noticing, it had become late at night when he put aside the last bar of the metal.

"Tomorrow we can start forging the parts of your body. I hope you are happy..." Seth said tiredly.

~ I am satisfied with your progress. ~

Since Seth had just returned it would take some time for him to return to his full Duty as a Tower Master. After a short meeting in the morning, he was free to keep working on the vessel.

But instead of getting right back to it, he took some time to take a look at the situation in the tower. He found Fin, playing with Pip, Ruby, and the other children. Seth was coaxed to play along for a little while before he went to visit Alison and Evee in the laboratories.

He learned how unfair it was to play catch against the fairy. She was merciless in her pursuit of victory. At least, she didn't show Seth any mercy.

Nothing much had changed in the laboratories, where Alison and Evee spent most of their time locked up.

Alison showed him a row of new inks she had developed and as they were talking, Seth's remembered the books given by Master Mountain. He explained what had happened to Alison and handed her the book on foreign alchemy to study.

Evee was still ecstatic that her spatial beacon had actually worked. Listening to her talk about everything that could have gone wrong, made the blacksmith a little queasy. Maybe he had trusted this whole thing a little too much.

He was glad that he had left the Chimeras and refugees with the rescue forces. With that many people, something terrible might have happened.

His last halt was a visit at the herb garden where he met Bilko and Otto the pharmacist. The latter excitedly talked about the skills that the children and especially Pip had shown in the care of plants.

Otto even went as far as to ask to be in charge of the group of children in Minas Mar. It was not only that he was impressed with their skills, but he wanted to teach them and learn from them at the same time.

Seth was not too familiar with the quirky pharmacist, but he was brought in by Bulko. As long as Pip agreed to it, there was no problem.

Seth had lunch with Mina before he finally returned to the workshop where he found Wedan waiting for him.

"Wedan? What are you doing here?" he asked the young dwarf.

"Hello Tower Master! I came to work since it was decided yesterday." the dwarf answered eagerly.

"Just keep calling me Seth, Wedan. I like your enthusiasm, but you can still take a few days to break, really."

Seeing the disappointment on the dwarf's face, made him feel bad. It was like looking at a sad puppy. How much did this dwarf like to work?

"How about this: Let's construct you a personal workshop down here. It should take a day or two at max. Then you can work on your own accord as much as you want." he suggested.

It would take long for the Maintenace bots of the tower to carve out and refine another space for a workshop. When he mentioned it Wedan's eyes lit up.

"My own workshop! Yes!"

"Then, take another two days off until it's ready."

The dwarf nodded and ran off. Seth really did not know what his deal was, but he would not complain about motivated employees. Before he forgot it, he returned to the control center to order the build of the new workshop.

Then, he finally returned to the workshop to start his work on the vessel. Although the day was not young anymore, the blacksmith did not have to work until deep into the night to finish the first step.

This first step was rather simple and only needed him to skillfully forge a simplified humanoid skeleton. It took him a moment to get used to the properties of the foreign metal, but he already had a similar experience with the body of an angel.

Once he got used to the properties of the material there were no huge technical challenges for him. Especially since he didn't have to study some rotten bones to feed the shape into <Blueprint>.

Although he couldn't use <Blueprint> to make the final product, he could make some of the more difficult parts from a different material to get a feel for it, before doing it with the angel's metal.

Since it was mostly forging, his forte, it did not take long to finish the basis. The real challenge would be the next step: Carving all kinds of enchantments and arrays onto this base.