Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

~ Seth, they are coming.~

Seth had slept quite deep thanks to his fatigue, not even the hard and uncomfortable bed could have changed that.

He heard the key rattle in the lock of the door. He just sat up when it swung open. Two workers led by a well-kempt officer brought in two big boxes and put them on the wall beside the door.

"This is your quota. Finish it in the next 6 days," he said with visible disgust at Seth who still wore the dirty set of clothes and had not washed up before falling asleep. He put the paper on a workbench and left without looking back.

The worker followed and the door was closed behind them. When Seth stood up to take a look at the materials, they brought him this time he found his breakfast on the boxes. They had brought it in at the same time.

Seth was not one to deny food, even if it was bad like this one. At first glance, it was the unidentifiable porridge they gave him every morning. But this time it tasted slightly better and sweeter.

Was it because he had shown his worth and now, he got slightly better treatment? It didn't matter. He already made up a plan to escape. 6 days should be enough to fix up his own gear. At least the most important ones.

Seth took a look at the paper. No wonder the food was better, their demands increased. 5 Swords and 3 maces in 6 days. No problem for Seth but a guaranteed death of fatigue for a normal blacksmith.

~ It's a test. ~

"Yep."

~ A test? ~ Puffles questioned.

"A normal blacksmith, as I am acting as, could hardly achieve this without major flaws in quality. If I were to just brainlessly make these weapons well, they would know I am more than "just" a blacksmith. They are already suspicious. It's good that we will escape here soon."

Seth took a look at the materials in the boxes, and it assured him, that this was a test. One box had two different kinds of epic woods. The other box was half-filled with <Artificial Adamantium> and the other half was actual <Adamantium>.

Seth had never used <Adamantium> before but he knew that it was extremely hard and durable and had a natural resistance to magic. The system described it as an epic material, but for a blacksmith, it was a legendary difficulty to forge it.

Even Seth guessed that he would need one or two days to make a single sword from this stuff. He gladly pocketed this for later.

Since he was now alone, he could start working on his own soul armament. He felt especially confident because of the perk <Soul Forging> had gotten with level 6.

With level 6 the soul armament would have the same effects as it would have after being infused into an item. It would not be weakened anymore by its immaterial nature.

But the soul armaments had to wait. He started with the most important of them all. The indispensable item for his escape. An Olympian blueprint unlocked with his skill's rank up.

The Helm of Hades, also known as his Cap of Invisibility. It made other unable to notice his him. Even gods or angels would be unable to detect him. If he managed to make this there should be no problem exploring the place.

It was only possible because Seth was lucky enough to still have 3 bars of epic-rated <Olympian Silver>. 2 would be enough for the helmet which meant he had one spare bar. The difficulty came with the whole process of making.

On one hand, Seth had more or less avoided making helmets if not needed. It meant that he was not as practiced in driving the metal. This was a hurdle in making the Helm of Hades as he needed to forge it from a single piece of metal.

It was one of those fierce-looking helmets from Olympian myths like those that hoplites would wear to battle. It had a nose guard, sharp-looking eye sights, and impressive cheek guards.

The second hurdle was that it came with its own smithing ballad. It was a language he could not even understand with <Universal Translation> and the only reason he was even ready to try it was that the whole text and melody was projected into his brain when he studied the blueprint.

He would just need to repeat and sing along with a completely foreign language while forging a helmet he was not used to, easy right?

But it didn't end there, as the cap also came with its own enchantment which covered the whole piece in intricate detail. For Seth, it simply looked like ornate engravings of soldiers and battles. He had no idea which wart was responsible for the magical effects...

His heart sank and his intestines formed a massive knot at the thought of the work that was awaiting him with this item. He took a deep breath. It wasn't like he had a choice. Right now it looked like much, but he would just have to start and do it step by step.

With these thoughts, Seth went to work. He fused two of the silver bars and started driving the metal, following the divine blueprint. At first, it was hard and he made many mistakes. He missed the spots he wanted to hit and he hit too hard and had to spend time fixing these mistakes.

All while awkwardly forming the foreign words in his head and trying to stay in tune. Every mistake in forging could mess up his singing and vice versa the stress of missing a note could mess up his hammer strikes.

After an hour or two, he had lost his sense for time, he finally fell into a groove. It wasn't like he spent his time at the Bard College for nothing. After repeating the ballad several times and learning from his mistakes he managed to sing it along flawlessly even without knowing what he sang.

He had spent even longer forging metal and once he got the knack of it, he actually started having fun driving the metal in shape. At one point came the time when these two feelings united and he struck and drove the metal along with the tune of the song.

Here Seth made the decisive decision to scrap what he had done so far and start over. As a blacksmith one needed to be able to make such decisions. Seth put the half-finished and crude-looking helmet into the furnace.

He added the spare bar of silver to it and started powering up the bluish pale spirit flames. He only left out a small part of the silver to make an engraving tool later.

Seth didn't notice any change and poured the metal into the casting mold for a bigger bar. But when the metal had solidified and he took the bar from the mold the blacksmith noticed a blue hue in the glimmer of the previously pristine silver metal.

He couldn't see any difference with <Blacksmith's Eyes>. It was still the same epic-rated <Olympian Silver>. Seth could only hope it wouldn't be a problem.

This time he started with the right timing and rhythm from the beginning and step by step the helmet took shape beneath his hands. He sang with <Orpheus' Voice> and <Voice of Seth> from the start but at some point, he felt his <Channeling> activate automatically.

The gaze of a pair of serious eyes, the presence of darkness and majesty. It felt like a ruler was gazing down on him. But there was no pressure. On the contrary, at most, there was guidance. Like that of a father who had a hard time showing his emotions.

When he finally finished the imposing-looking helmet, the presence didn't vanish. Seth didn't mind. He guessed this was Hades and hades had blessed him. If he wanted to watch then Seth didn't mind.

His next task was covering the piece in elaborate engravings and Seth finally had a guess of what they depicted. Looking closer they were most like the tales of Hades' deed in the war against the titans.

A figure walking among enemies without being seen. Sabotaging their ranks and siege weaponry. Stealing their plans and even assassinating their leaders.

Before he could engrave these pictures onto the helmet, he needed to make a new engraving tool. He didn't know whether <Adamantium> would work on <Olympian Silver>. Instead, he fashioned one from the same silver and tried hardening it.

With the new engraving tool, he started transferring the depictions of Hades' onto the helmet. The pressure of Hades increased in strength and it actually felt similar to inscribing demonic poems.

Seth had long lost any awareness of his surroundings. There were only his work and the presence behind him, watching him. It felt like a weird dream, that only ended when he finished carving the last stroke into the helmet.

The bright silver of the metal rapidly darkened, turning almost black with a silvery blue glint. The pressure vanished. The presence vanished. It was as if Seth had woken up from the weird dream.

~ You are finally responsive again! ~ Al exclaimed.

"What happened?"

~ You are back?! You didn't respond for almost two days! ~ Puffles answered this time.

"Two days?" he asked perplexed. When he looked at the door, he saw 3 bowls of slob piling before the hatch in the door. He got two meals a day, this meant what they said was true. He had worked from the day the materials came to the evening of the second day.

His stomach gave off an affirmative growl. He had not eaten a thing for over a day. The fatigue was also catching up to him in a sudden rush.

The slops from today were still okay so he chucked those down before filling his stomach further with food from his inventory. The one from yesterday smelled bad so he emptied it into the forge where the food was burned.

He put the three clean bowls before the hatch and laid down on his bed. He fell asleep immediately.