Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

Over the next few days, Seth mostly took a break. He would spend most of his time with Mina and Fin, as they waited for the return of the other teams. The blacksmith only returned to his workshop once in a while to work on the prototype of the Armor of Lunacy. Aside from this, he paid a visit to the people Leana had invited.

"Good morning, Senior White. I didn't expect you to be serious when you said that you would come," he greeted the first person he visited.

Stretched out and relaxing on the sofa of the guest room laid a sensual beauty. Skin and hair as pale as snow, with long legs peeking out from her robe and fine fingers flipping through the paged of her book. Her pair of almond-shaped eyes with vertical pupils looked up from her book when the blacksmith spoke up. Only the small scale pattern on her cheeks gave an idea of her origin.

"I told you, I would try to follow once my business was done. Wasn't it you, who offered me a new home? It just took a little longer, because these Chrona people wouldn't let me move," she said with a huff.

<White Snake of the Mountain Lake lv.177>

Seth inadvertently checked her status. It was really the White Snake deity Seth had met in Keväti Kuinen during the empire's evaluation. Back then she was the deity of a whole region and had used her powers in an attempt to save her people from the sun god's wrath.

Although she was unsuccessful and weakened at the time, she had been a great help to their team back then. She guided them through the fog and helped to find the rest of the party. Without her, their chances of dying would have been very high.

"Did you manage to recover?" Seth asked, sitting down opposite her.

"Only physically. All my people died, there is no way to recover without them," she said solemnly.

After his talk with Leana, Seth had a much better understanding of what Senior White was talking about. Deities were like people on their path to becoming a legend, except that their end goal was to become a full-fledged god.

But even full gods could experience this. Nas'Korn for example. Despite being a god, Nas'Korn was by far not as imposing a figure as Hades, Apollo, or even Eos. It was all a matter of their believers and the devotion of their belief.

Despite her level being high, without her believers and their power, her abilities and strength were severely restricted. Still, the fact that <Theia's Discerning Eyes> couldn't see anything past her level meant that she was by no means weak, even without her believers.

"I'm sorry, but I believe that I may have a solution that will help both of us," Seth opened the main topic.

This was more or less Leana's plan, but it wouldn't work without Seth's groundwork, of having a relationship with the deity to begin with. One of the contingency plans against a possible invasion of Y-City was to strengthen the individual Tee Stations through a guardian figure.

In Little Sigma it was Vlad, the incredibly powerful Vampire who also acted as the current governor and leader of the city. Someone like Senior White, could take the role of a guardian deity and act in a similar way to Nas'Korn.

Languidly, the snake lady changed her position on the sofa as she pondered over what he said. It was hard to tell whether she was a snake or a cat at this point.

"So you give me a home and people to protect and in exchange, these people will worship me?" she asked slowly.

"Err, well, the people of Urth are not very experienced when it comes to believing in gods, so you may have to speak with them and teach them how to worship you. But in general, I can guarantee you that we won't allow any foreign religions to settle in your place."

What Seth promised technically included all religions currently practiced on Urth, since they all were imported through the Pathworks. The people of Urth had long lost actual belief in something like gods. Except for gods like Samhach and Nas'korn who somehow managed to resurface, there was no native religion.

"That is acceptable. Thank you for offering me a new home. Where will that city be, is there a nice lake?" She readily agreed and moved on to discuss the interior design and landscaping she hoped for.

"How about you choose one for yourself? I will ask someone to be your guide and you can travel along the tree route and see what place you like," Seth offered her, since he had no idea anymore, where there were any good mountain lakes along the route. She probably wanted one, because her name literally asked for one.

Since they were so high up, most Tree Stations were surrounded by snowy mountains. However, the crown of the Hangingtree that stopped the winds and the barrier set in place usually created a moderate climate in its shade. It was absolutely possible that there was a nice mountain lake somewhere under one of the trees.

"Alright, when can we go~?" she jumped up motivated, yet her voice was still calm, almost emotionless.

"I will ask a friend who knows the route well. Maybe he can already tell you of a few nice places before you even set off. You can set off as soon as he is ready." Seth said with a smile, seeing her suddenly so active.

The blacksmith was going to ask Drosi and the Tijaahk Caravan to take her along and look for a good tree station to settle her. Currently Senior White had the right of first choice. All Tree Stations, except for little Sigma, were up for grabs.

"Cat people? How curious!" she exclaimed when he told her about Drosi and his people.

Although she didn't talk a lot or showed much expression, Seth was glad she seemed interested in the journey and her travel companions. He was sure, no matter what place she chose, it would quickly grow. After all, in their current world, was more important than living in a place with a strong protector?

…

---Colossal Dungeon---

<Ding! You have leveled up! You are now lv.95!>

Accompanied by the party's collective sigh of relief a mass being slumped over lifeless and fell down the stairs. Lydia and her part had used the special landing where the elite colossal guards stopped following them last time as a farming spot.

They would pull the guard on a chase down the stairway. Minutely controlling their aggro they managed to make one of them chase them for longer than the others. Pulling them one by one like this was not easy, but safer than trying to face them all at once. By the time party finally leveled up, they had emptied two floors of living elite guards in the late lv.90s.

"Hey, I got a weird quest. Something about the last stretch?" Archer spoke up, staring at the empty air in front of his face where the quest window only he could see was.

"You too?" Lydia exclaimed. " Me three," Duhu spoke up.

It was revealed that everyone on the team had gotten the quest, except for Azul, Jess, and James.

"Why didn't we get that quest?" "Yeah!" the exceptions two and three piped up indignantly after the rest of the party shared the quest info with them, excluding several words that were beeped out by the system.

"I guess that path is barred for me since I'm a chimera?" Azul said a little depressed.

"Don't say stuff like that." "Yeah, I bet it's just that we are still lacking something. The system if fair, I doubt it would deliberately exclude you because you are built differently." Jess and James comforted her.

"Right, look at those two. Despite getting preferential treatment as ori humas, they didn't get the quest either. I bet there is a requirement that needs to be triggered to get the quest," Lydia assured Azul, ignoring the couples stinging gazes.

"I-i also didn't get that quest," Ferdinand interjected meekly, but nobody paid him any attention.

"We should return for now. I'm sure Princess Leana or Bement could help us answer these questions," Duhu suggested.

"Good idea, we should give this some serious thought before we continue leveling." Lydia agreed.

With everyone in agreement, Team 3 abandoned the colossal dungeon. Walking all the way back to the mouse hole they entered through, they were finally able to return to Minas Mar, after leaving the dungeon.