Chương 166: 157. The furnace

We used a ladder to get down to the room below. This one was bigger, stretching under most of the apartment building. It was built without any decoration, the stonework looking rushed and uneven even to my amateurish eyes. We were in the storage area, and to the right, I could see a large arched portal leading to the real smithy. It was an impressive sight. It took up over half of the underground complex.

Through the wide entrance, I could see a massive furnace and multiple workstations for smiths, as well as stations for weavers and enchanters. The weapons here in the storage were relatively normal ones—well-made, a few common artifacts, but that was all—but the ones still lying on the workstations were much more interesting. Even from here, I could see the runes shining on the polished metal. But there was a problem—there were creatures still working on them.

Each station consisted of a table, tools, and a person grown into the structure. The workbenches had arms and heads on elongated, bony necks. Others had fully human bodies merged into the machines before them by wooden or metallic tendrils. They weren't looking at us at all, but repeated the same motions, working on what was in front of them, unwaveringly focused. I could see the sweat clearly pouring from their foreheads—whether from the strain or the warmth of the massive furnace, I wasn't sure.

We looked at one another.

"Let's just take those and go," Luna said, pointing at the weapons around us. I looked at the ladder and saw that the other group had left their observation spot and joined us.

"You think they're dangerous?" I asked Astrid once she made her way down. She tilted her head, looking at the smithy.

"No… but there is something wrong here." She basically confirmed what I felt in the place's aura. However, it wasn't putting me on edge.

"Your decision," I said to the others.

"I'm in favor of going into the workshop."

"Me too," Ophelia said. I followed her gaze and noticed it was fixed on a rapier lying in front of one of the workers, constantly polished by a hand growing out of the table's base.

"I ain't missin' a good fight," Bolo said while taking a good look around the room.

"Hell yeah." Darius gave a quick thumbs-up in agreement. Luna was less happy about the idea, while William was clearly torn. He wasn't the most eager for another battle, but at the same time, all he had was one ceremonial dagger after he'd lent a spare to Ophelia. Anyone who spent most of his life walking around armed felt naked without their weapon of choice, so after a brief voting session, we decided to try to get ourselves some weapons and artifacts.

Slowly, taking formation with Darius and Bolo at the front, we made our way into the workshop. As we approached, I could feel the heat from the massive furnace at the front growing more pronounced. It was the kind of humid, sticky warmth that left one covered in sweat in seconds. Once inside, more workstations came into view. Those away from the furnace looked like weaving stations—at least as far as I could judge by the looms, with hands and eyes growing from the frames and combs grown into fleshy appendages.

In the center, by the opposite wall, stood the massive furnace and blacksmithing stations powered by it. And the most striking feature was the silence—all the mutated machines worked in perfect quiet.

"Is that all?" Aiko asked next to me in the back.

"No," Astrid said before we could say anything.

"The aura here speaks of danger." I turned to her and saw her eyes were closed and her brow furrowed. I felt a similar aura of danger, but no source of it could be seen—until a voice echoed around the room.

"You did not meet the quota." Deep, rumbling words cut through the silence. We all looked around for the source, but all the stations just started working faster and faster.

"The war effort hangs by a thread!" the voice rang out once again, and this time all of us looked to the front as it was accompanied by movement. The pipes and stabilizers holding the massive furnace in place groaned. A loud snap echoed through the room as they were pulled out of the walls and the opening. We all looked in shock at the heart of the smithy, which used the bent metal as leverage to turn around and face us. We all saw a dwarf grafted into the front of the iron construction.

He had a haggard face and a long, unkempt beard. When he spoke, he would just open his mouth, and the sound came out of the other side, from the open hearth. Previously, the sound traveled through the connected pipes, but now that most of them were broken, it was clear where the voice was coming from.

"We won't meet the quota!" it screamed, a strange note of desperation in the voice, as the pipes on one "arm" formed into something akin to a hammer. I saw the smaller pieces of metal form into a sigil—the same one we saw on the hammer upstairs.

"What do we do?" Aiko asked, clearly on edge. The enemy was intimidating, but I could also sense the aura of a creature around the third circle.

"We can take him," I said. Darius and Bolo didn't need much convincing as they rushed forward. Astrid, William, and Ophelia went after them, ready to jump in and deal some damage, while I, Luna, Aiko, and the warlock stayed back. The creature swung a long, barbed metal arm, and Darius turned his sword around, slamming it into the ground to block the strike. The attack was powerful enough to move him as the khopesh left a deep gouge in the stone floor.

The next arm with the hammer also came down, but this time, Astrid, Ophelia, and William attacked from the side as Bolo slipped under it, wings once again spreading from his back as he rammed into where the metal met the furnace. But his saber left only a shallow gash. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. The creature pulled both of its arms upward, ready for another strike.

"Now!" I shouted and fired a barrage into the dwarf. Our initial shots connected, though the flesh didn't tear easily and acted like metal, but a howl of pain could still be heard. Then some of the pipes and smaller elements started weaving themselves around the grafted dwarf in makeshift armor. We prepared another barrage as the fighters readied to deal with the arms, but the creature didn't slam the two hands down.

The appendages instead spread into a net of metal and anchored into the ceiling as the furnace pulled itself upwards to hover over the fighters. It lifted its many iron tentacles, once legs, up into the air.

"Dodge!" Astrid screamed as the barbed metal came down from the ceiling in a rain of piercing strikes. Astrid's shout wasn't fast enough for everyone. Darius received a wound to the shoulder, and Ophelia almost got her leg skewered, but they moved away in time.

"The hands!" I shouted, and we directed our shots at the arms, deepening the gash by the "shoulder" left by Bolo. The creature used its many legs to shield, but that gave me time to overcharge a third-circle spell. A large, sharpened bone spear appeared in front of me, lacking any barbs. Instead, its head widened into a flat, leaf-like blade. My friends didn't need any commands. Darius looked at his cut shoulder, and Luna nodded at him. He dived under the creature, baiting an attack.

It dropped the shield made from its legs, going for a sure kill, but before it could bring them down, the blood on Darius clung like slime and pulled him from underneath the strike. I fired the spear at the exposed shoulder, and a snap of metal rang out as the monstrosity came down with a crash. William and Ophelia moved in front to strike, but a shout from Astrid stopped them.

"Move back!" she roared. Thankfully, they didn't question it, and a second later, I knew what it was that she felt.

"Shields!" I shouted. Everyone moved behind us. In the cloud of dust stirred by the metal slamming into the floor, I could see that the monster rolled itself to face us with its back. The hearth opened wide, lighting up the dust with an orange glow, and a jet of flame came from it, ramming into our spells. We held, casting magic over and over as the heat started becoming overwhelming. I felt like my hands, dancing in runic patterns to ease the casting, were about to boil. But finally, the creature stopped.

I supplemented the casting with hand gestures and sometimes even chanting, but casting still irritated my mental wounds. I took a swig of the stolen orange juice—or what was left of it after sharing with the rest—and felt the pain ease.

"Yeeeah. That's a fight!" I heard Darius, who was apparently now celebrating with Bolo. Everyone began smiling, myself included. That was a good fight. The creature, while powerful, clearly wasn't a seasoned warrior. Looking around, I saw that the flames didn't do anything to the workstations. The machines the jet touched were just working visibly faster, but that was all—no smoke or fire to deal with. We all sat down to recuperate before picking our prizes.

"Impressive casting," Astrid said, plopping herself next to me.

"Sharp instincts," I praised. It was true—she always warned a split second before I picked up on the danger. My words got me a smile and a…

"Ooooooh. Impressive," Darius said in an overly flirtatious voice, feeling up William.

"Impressive, too," William responded with the same pretend flirtatious tone, as both of them looked me in the eyes.

"I don't know any of them," I informed Astrid in a matter-of-fact voice. We sat there in a relatively relaxed atmosphere, although still keeping a lookout for any sudden changes. And once we got our breathing back to normal, we went around the place. There were many different weapons, from axes and warhammers to daggers and rapiers. Sadly, there wasn't anything suitable for a caster—at least in the weapons department.

Seeing that, I went straight to the weaving stations to check out the robes there, since I was in desperate need of one myself. I picked the biggest, strangest station and approached it. It had many hands—five from what I could see—smoothing out creases in a decorated robe. It was deep blue, with sharp geometric patterns woven in lighter shades of blue and gold. The tight sleeves and tougher fabric around the chest marked it as a battle robe. I took a close look at the runes.

It had some sort of protection woven into it—armor deployment using the caster's mana—as well as… I frowned. I then went to another robe, and another, my brows knitting together with each piece of clothing I saw. They all shared the same thing. Every piece of clothing in the room had environmental protections woven into it, meant to withstand extreme weather. One robe like that could be a coincidence, but every robe created here by the singularity? Not likely.

"Start with the clothes," I commanded.

"They take priority." We started packing things up, and there was a lot to pack, from robes to weapons and armor. Some of it was mundane. Other pieces were clearly high-quality artifacts. Ophelia was playing around with the rapier. It was decorated in black and blue, with a deathly aura covering the blade. It was weak, as the weapon was most likely beyond her power level, but some of the enchantments were still active. I picked up the blue robe as well as a ring with a single Shield spell stored.

Everyone got first pick of the loot, and we took as much as we could of the rest and slowly made our way back in a celebratory mood. Sadly, the good atmosphere didn't last too long. It was about halfway back when we heard it. A rooster crow echoed over the city. The moment it did, all of us, not just Astrid, got a bad feeling in our guts. An uncomfortable shot of adrenaline with no obvious source.

"We should hurry," Ophelia said, looking around.

"Yeah," I agreed. We got back to the safe spot as fast as the city would let us, but by then the situation already looked bad. The church group returned before us, as did the D'Arc expedition. The remaining two groups arrived almost at the same time as us. The church had clearly gotten into a fight—one I'm pretty sure they lost—and to my surprise, I couldn't see Zenon anywhere. Judging by Leo's twitchy movements, the cardinal was dead.

The paladins' armor bore clear signs of battle, with one of them having an entire shoulder plate ripped to shreds, the limb beneath not in much better condition. But the D'Arc group was even worse for wear, as they were missing the entirety of the second group. I looked around, but the people who volunteered were nowhere to be found. When we arrived, Jean was being yelled at by two of the people who'd stayed behind, most likely the families of those who volunteered to go with her.

"They didn't want to go. You were supposed to keep them safe," shouted one of the nobles who stayed behind.

"You think we are happy to go?" a man from behind Jean yelled back.

"We are risking our lives for ungrateful cowards like you." Two sides were clearly forming among the people. Once everyone was there, a meeting of the "council" was called, and we all went in—now down one member, the cardinal.

"What happened?" I asked, looking between the two groups.

"I have no idea," Jean D'Arc replied, looking around.

"We were walking along the street—no disturbances, no attacks. But halfway through the trip, they just… disappeared. They stayed behind us as suggested, but someone was keeping an eye on them—I made sure. I-I really did." She looked at us from one person to another while telling the story.

"Then we turned back and they just… weren't there."