Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

Marcel, the leader of the Volcano Guild, and Elza, from the Moutain Guild, stood side by side among the group of captives that had previously been abducted and split into Warriors and Magicians.

They had lived the last two weeks as puppets; forced to follow any command of their captors. Marcel had mostly stood guard, day and night. Even when he felt like passing out from fatigue, the alien curse kept him awake.

He had already been close to losing his sanity. But he felt like he still had it good. In the ice queen's eyes burned a fire fueled by pain and hatred so deep, Marcel couldn't possibly understand.

It had only been two hours since this nightmare was alleviated. Just two hours ago a priest had hurriedly woken them up from the little bit of sleep they were allowed to have.

Profusely sweating; he was babbling something about a rebellion and to get ready for battle just before an invisible blade split him apart. Behind him stood just a nun, before suddenly a man appeared beside her.

A man calling himself a blacksmith and master of Minas Mar. He used their inability to act on their own to explain his crazy plan of freeing them all. Only after he finished speaking did he start breaking the collars one by one using an eerie flame on his finger like a plasma cutter.

Their part in the plan was relatively simple. Get geared up, wait for his signal, and smash all the enemies in their path. Marcel liked this. Once the enemy was subjugated, they would proceed to free all the other slaves.

It wasn't enough to say that everyone agreed. Everyone was eager to get revenge. Especially those who had been slaves for longer than those abducted from the stadium. There were quite a few that were not even from Urth.

They settled on an easy command structure. Marcel, as a prominent Guild Master would lead the warriors from Delta. Elza would lead the caster from Urth for a similar reason. Those without connections to Urth chose two leaders among themself. It was simply easier that way.

Like this the roughly 400 people present at the dormitories had split into 4 troops of slightly differing sizes. After explaining everything to them the man had turned invisible again and left them with the Nun, who led them to the armory.

After upgrading their equipment from the crappy stuff, they had to wear as slave soldiers, all they had to do was wait for the signal and join the battle on the side of the rebels. Marcel even managed to secure some of his original armor.

Overall, plundering the armory led to an upgrade for most of the people present they were motivated to fight and eagerly waited for the signal.

Elza and Marcel used the time to consult with the leaders of the foreigners and came up with a formation for all of them. They had barely put some structure in their troops when they felt a pressure lifting together with a shrill alarm that suddenly filled the stronghold.

Just like the blacksmith had promised, their connection with the system had reconnected. They hurriedly got in position as they expected the signal to come soon.

And they were right, just moments later two huge pale blue fireballs exploded in the night sky like fireworks.

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In the courtyard below, where the Rift had been active previously, Seth could see almost orderly rows of Adventurers and their pets fall into the flanks of the chimeras and theocracy's troop who had cornered the rebels. Their ongoing survival was thanks to Duhu and the other foreign races who performed a lot better than anyone had expected.

Their level, their skills, their gear, and most importantly their overwhelming motivation to level this place and anyone responsible for it turned these forces into an unstoppable murder mob. The chimeras? What Chimeras? The Warden? Who? Nothing could resist their waves of sword&magic as they systematically tore their tormenters apart.

Seth felt somewhat awkward watching them like this and soon tore his gaze away from the scene. There was something else he had to do now. Find Meno and get rid of him. With him, the chimeras would lose their "owner" and probably stop moving.

Time for the Cloak of Hekate to shine. He pulled down the hood and concentrated on his target. Seth would have liked a quest marker, but it was more like a game of warm and cold. He had a hunch which direction to go, though it wasn't always easy to decide which was "warmer".

It didn't take too long, but with the battle raging outside it felt like ages. After taking a few wrong turns here and there he finally found a figure cowardly shooting a bow from one of the windows.

"Meno~" Seth breathed into the room.

In shock and surprise, the traitorous rebel leader turned around only to look into an empty room. The next moment an invisible blade stabbed his chest. It was a truly heart-rending experience right before departing the world of the living.

Well, that was anticlimactic, Seth thought to himself. What wasn't anticlimactic was the army of chimeras suddenly coming to a standstill. They ceased any movements and stood there mindlessly like they had in the dungeons.

Under the joint forces of the adventurers and the rebels, the last human followers in the inner yard of the stronghold lost their lives. What remained were the wardens and angels that had fled to the sky. The wardens were strong, but their numbers dwindled under the constant barrage from the enraged mob below.

The only persistent thread were the angels who displayed high resistance to magic and physical damage. They were comparable to mini-bosses. And there were still four of them left.

Nevertheless, the troops on the ground had the advantage and sieged them motivated by the visibly accumulating damage they caused. Everything was going as planned and it didn't seem like he would have to personally intervene.

Seth started relaxing.

It was a shame that the people of the theocracy did not give experience, otherwise everyone in the courtyard could have made a few levels. The people of the theocracy were just like the beasts in the fog dimension.

He had been very disappointed when he found out. Killing the priests neither gave him notification or experience. That was why Seth decided to harvest their souls. He wanted to gain at least something from this arduous work.

The problem was that the souls of priests were tainted by the power of their god. It was like how children would scribble their names on their toys. It was an imprint as if they had sold their soul to a demon.

Seth doubted this would have a positive effect on items. The chance of the items having an effect of "100% Hostility with Theocracy of Chains" was very high. Or one may become the sworn enemy of a god just by wearing the item.

~ Aren't we going to help them? My tremendous powers have grown past anything you could fathom! This me could easily take down one of those shiny robots! ~ Puffles interjected.

Their connection had finally reconnected after the suppression was lifted and they could communicate again. The Ivicer seemed to itch for a fight.

"I know, but we have another place to visit. " Seth had to disappoint the caterpillar.

Seeing everything slowly coming to an end he left when he saw the first angel fall from the sky. At the storage rooms in the servant quarters, he met up with Lynri. This was something Seth had been itching to do since he came across.

All in all, Seth looted several dozen crates filled to the brim with <High-Quality Steel>

"Just where did they get this much?" he mumbled absentmindedly as he kept storing the crates in his inventory.

"During the initial construction of the stronghold, the scouts found vast resources of good quality iron in the surrounding ruins. The first task of the slaves was actually to harvest the surrounding iton for building materials." Lynri suddenly mentioned.

"Have you been here for that long?"

"Me? No. But I heard about it. A lot of the iron was sent back until they lost too many slaves out there. One of the others mentioned that the big road was probably to harvest this place more efficiently. "

"I see. Let's keep going. I am done here."

On the way to the next place, they came across a few guards and priests who had just returned to the stronghold after hearing the alarms. They departed, the moment they saw Lynri.

The place they arrived at was the stronghold's smithy. The official one. It was a big workshop with high-grade crafting stations, and equipment. The room was dark, the forge was cold, and nobody could be seen.

Under Seth's flames the reinforced steel door covered in magic symbols turned into a puddle of molten slag. Neither the material nor the enchantments could withstand the determined blacksmith and he didn't mind the alarms going off.

It had been the last barrier. Behind the now liquified door was the material storage of the smithy. Although their work was not over when the angels were defeated, Seth was sure many of the adventurers outside would devolve into a looting mob once the immediate danger was gone.

As the main actor in this play, he wanted to make sure to secure his fee before the curtain fell.