Rise of the Living Forge - Chapters 517-518

Arwin lost himself in the song. His body moved to its own accord and the ring of Caldera against metal echoed through his mind like a distant drum. It was impossible to say for how long they’d been working, but it didn’t feel like it had been long.

He’d only managed to lead the group for a few minutes before he’d been forced to take a step back from the front. Keeping everyone synchronized and focused was an immense task — one far greater than he ever could have expected.

But no sooner than Arwin’s song receded did Wallace’s rise up to take its place. The dwarf took the lead of the song, guiding all of them as they all worked to create the body for the Den’s core.

Both he and Koyu worked the metal, doing far more than just lending Arwin energy. The dwarf prepared the materials, melding them with the lava and purging the impurities from them. He passed each finished piece to the Lich, who melded the quiet songs of the materials with the symphony filling the smithy all around them.

Those pieces went to Arwin. He applied the finishing blows, forging the materials from potential into reality. Caldera flattened out metal and formed the pieces of what would soon become armor. Every blow he made felt like it had three minds behind it — Lillia, him, and the Core.

Every single one of them poured the very essence of their beings into each strike Arwin made. All the while, the Infernal Armory kept everyone together. It worked to fill in the gaps and ensured everyone remained connected. When their power waned, it adjusted the flow of magic to make up for it. When they grew weary, it supported them. When they needed materials, it delivered them.

Wallace soon grew tired. He relinquished the lead position of the song and Koyu took his place. And in that manner, they continued. Raw metal became purged and pure. It joined the song and was made from metal and monster part into the pieces of an enormous suit of armor, wild and hungry with potential.

The power in every single piece of metal was terrifying to think about. Creating a set with this much magic would have taken Arwin at least a week if he’d tried it on his own. For that matter, he was pretty sure it wouldn’t have even been possible.

Something this powerful needed to be assembled quickly. Making just one part a day would result in a lesser product. No, this was the kind of equipment that could only be formed by an entire team working together.

Koyu soon grew tired. Lillia took his place as the lead of the song, and their work continued. When her turn drew to a close, the Infernal Armory stepped in. It wouldn’t have been accurate to say that each lead sang exactly the same way.

Arwin’s vision wasn’t exactly the same as Wallace’s was, and the dwarf didn’t see the world in the same manner that the Lich did. They all had the same goal, but they took different paths to get there.

But a song was not stiff. This was a play of multiple parts. No part was the same as the previous. They were all different — each one a unique step in the same direction.

By the time the Infernal Armory’s power had started to wane, Arwin had managed to recover enough strength to step forward to take the lead once more. But, before he could, someone else took his place.

The Core itself.

Arwin had never had a component literally take the lead of its own creation. They’d helped before, but this may as well have been a man assembling himself. It felt paradoxical.  Then again, Arwin had never worked with anything like the Den’s core.

There was no room for surprise. They simply all let the Core take the lead, joining into the song as the next step in the journey.  

And, when the Core grew weary, Arwin took its place.

The six of them worked in shifts. They never stopped or slowed. There was no room for a mistake or hesitation in a project as vast and powerful as this one. The only path that didn’t result in failure was to march forward.

Plates of armor soon formed into proper shapes. The first finished component were the gauntlets, formed of reddish-black metal and trimmed with brilliant crimson detailing. They were studded with razor-sharp black claws that protruded from their knuckles. Each of them was more than twice the size of Arwin’s own gauntlets.

They were beautiful — but less than half of the artisanship that had gone into the equipment was visible from outside. Veins of black metal ran throughout the inside portions of the gauntlets, known only to the six who had created them. They would ferry the magic throughout the massive suit of armor efficiently.

Next came the greaves, made from the same material but with rows of spikes running down the sides of their legs like the back of a dragon. The helm came after. It almost appeared to be carved from a single massive piece of matching metal, its eyes dark pits and mouth a row of vertical bars that offered only the faintest of glimpses into the darkness behind.

Sprouting from either side of the helm’s forehead were two massive horns. They jutted straight into the air, made from dozens of black claws that had been twisted and locked together like the hands of the damned trying to claw their way free from the afterlife all at once.

The final piece of the armor they created was the chestpiece. It was huge, easily twice as large as Arwin’s own, with the same spiked segments as the rest of the armor. Large pauldrons protected the shoulder portions, each one rising up into a curled spike of black metal.

And in the very center of the chestpiece was an open slot accessible only from where it would connect to the greaves. Strands of flexible metal ran throughout its inside in a spiderweb. At their center was a cradle perfectly sized for the Core.

So much magic twisted in the air that Arwin could literally taste it. He couldn’t even separate one flavor from the others. There was ocean and blood and fire and cooked meat and everything in between.

The complexity of this piece was beyond everything they’d made before. There were so many desires all woven into a single result that none of them could be distinguished anymore. All that remained was the final result… and one last step.

Exhaustion clung to Arwin’s body like a weighted cloak. He was completely spent, and so were all of the others. The sound of their heavy breathing was the only noise left within the Infernal Armory.

Arwin lifted the Core with weakened arms. It felt lighter than it had when they’d gotten started, but it was still heavy enough that just moving it felt like a gargantuan task. He was back in lead of the song — but he wouldn’t be passing it over to anyone else this time.

Wallace and Koyu steadied the centerpiece of the armor. None of them said a word. They didn’t need to. Every single being in this room knew exactly what they were doing.

Arwin gingerly lowered the Core into the center of the armor. He moved it past the strands of metal, pushing them gently out of the way and bringing the black chunk brimming with magical power into position.

The Infernal Armory lifted the gauntleted arm segments of the Soul Guardian, while Lillia readied the greaves.

Arwin slotted the core into its cradle.

It slid into place with a definitive click.  

He pulled his hands back as a dull hum filled the room. Power ignited within the strands of metal inside the armor, twisting down them like wildfire. Wallace and Koyu immediately flipped the midsection of the Soul Guardian over, raising it up into the air as Lillia positioned the legs beneath it.

A wave of hot air blew into Arwin’s face with enough intensity to blow his hair back. He ignored the rising temperature and helped Lillia steady the legs — each of which were nearly as tall as they were. The Infernal Armory grabbed the centerpiece of the Soul Guardian with a tendril and hoisted it into position, lowering it onto the legs.

There were two more clicks. The hum filling the room grew louder. Arwin’s hair stood on end. He tasted electricity dancing across his tongue, but they weren’t done yet.

Black tendrils twisted past him as the Infernal Armory moved the arms of the Guardian into position. It was too high for Arwin to even properly reach up to help. More heat and pressure buffeted his face as another pair of clicks echoed through the room.

A gale swirled out from the armor. It beat against Arwin, nearly knocking him over. One final tendril extended out to him and Lillia, bearing the helm upon it.

The Armory could have placed the helm itself, but the song was still going. And the song spoke to the Core’s desires. Even within the armor, it would not allow the Armory to place the final part of the Soul Guardian. There was only a single person within this room that was granted that permission.

Lillia lifted the huge headpiece by the horns, then glanced to Arwin.

He lowered to one knee. She threw one leg over his shoulder, then leaned against the back of his head as she did the same with the other leg. Arwin rose back to his feet in a smooth motion, lifting Lillia into the air and steadying her sides with his hands.

Arwin swayed. Exhaustion bore down on him stronger than ever. Wallace and Koyu stabilized him. Lillia grunted as she raised the heavy helm above her head, her own arms swaying.

One of the Infernal Armory’s black tendrils coiled out, gently guiding her into the proper position so that the helm was positioned above its connecting point with the rest of the massive Soul Guardian. She was just barely able to reach it.

But barely was enough.

Lillia released the helm.

It slotted down into place with a final click.

The song ended.

There was a single instant of silence. An instant where they all stared up at the results of their work, frozen. Lillia clung to the top of Arwin’s head. His feet only remained out from under him because of the support of Koyu and Wallace, who had basically collapsed against him.

Not a single one of them spoke a word. They simply waited.

Then, with a thunderous roar like that of a thousand cannons firing at once, lines of magic raced out across the Soul Guardian’s body, following the path of the veins that had been carved on the inside of the armor.

Pressure slammed into them all like a hammer. The precarious pyramid went tumbling to the ground as they were all thrown across the room and into the back wall with a resounding crash.

Raw magic coursed through the air with such intensity that Arwin could literally see it. Even through his exhaustion and pain, his lips parted in awe. Rivers of brilliant gold swirled through the air to pour into the finished Soul Guardian.

Lillia let out an awed sound, little more than a gasp, from where she’d fallen beside Arwin in the mess of limbs. None of them even tried to extract themselves. They didn’t have the energy to do anything but watch.

As quickly as the light had appeared, it vanished.

There was one more moment of silence.

The Soul Guardian’s eyes ignited, flashing to life like two pools of molten gold.

They had succeeded. The Guardian was complete, standing nearly twice his height like some avenging warrior that guarded over the gates of the underworld itself.

Golden letters traced through the air before Arwin as the Mesh finally made itself known.  He didn’t get a chance to read a single word. Energy rushed into him with the force of a crashing tsunami. His breath caught in his chest as the final scraps of his awareness were washed away.

And then, with a smile flickering across his lips and together with every other person in the pile around him, Arwin slipped into unconsciousness.

Chapter 518

The first thing that Arwin saw when he came to was gold. It blurred before his face like a molten sea of wealth, fading in and out of view in an undulating dance. A distant headache pounded in the back of his skull to the beat of a particularly inept conductor that really needed to be fired and his mouth tasted like ash and salt.

He grimaced, squeezing his eyes shut for a long second. The world spun all around him — or perhaps he was the one that was spinning. It was a little hard to tell. His body didn’t seem to be in a very cooperative mood at the moment.

Even his thoughts were sluggish and slow. Putting two of them together was difficult enough. Trying to convince his arms or legs to move was an entirely separate matter.

Arwin stared at the insides of his eyelids. Sleep swam just at the edges of his thoughts, but it was held at bay by the sharp bits of something or another that incessantly poked up into his back. There was a crick in the side of his neck. There was also one in his hip. And his arm. And his leg. It was in a few of his fingers as well.

For that matter, the more consciousness reluctantly dragged itself back into his body, the more cricks he realized he had. There were more parts of him in pain than parts that weren’t. And there was still that shimmering gold piercing into his skull.

Not even closing his eyes could mute it out. It seared before him like the sun itself had been channeled into lines, and they didn’t seem to have any plans of leaving until he acknowledged them.

What the hell is—

And then Arwin remembered.

His eyes snapped open as he drew in a sharp gasp, one that quickly proved to be a mistake. Arwin instantly choked as ash and dust darted into his lungs. He doubled over, coughing and wheezing, only to find his breath frozen in his lungs.

Shimmering gold rivers came into focus before his eyes.

Uriel, The Gatekeeper

[Soulforged]: Forged at the hands of a Forbidden Soulmancer, a Dwarven Smith, a Lich, an awakened building, the Hearthmother, and Uriel herself, Uriel is the soul of the Devil’s Den made manifest. She acknowledges no master.

[Transcendent]: Uriel, the Gatekeeper is a Transcendent creation. Forged at the hands of multiple Sunsetted classes, just as her creators, she exists outside the boundaries of the Mesh itself. Her power is hers to use and cultivate at will.

[Eternal]: Uriel, the Gatekeeper is highly resistant to all forms of physical and magical damage. Charms and mental magic are entirely ineffective against her, and weapons without sufficient magical energy will be overloaded and destroyed upon contact with her body.

[One Armor Army]: Uriel, the Gatekeeper can draw magical power from all those who reside within the walls of the Devil’s Den and bend it to her will, using it to power any of her abilities or reinforce her strength.

[Sword of the Great Garden]: At a continuous cost of great magical energy, Uriel can summon forth a soul-cutting blade of Hearth-flame that penetrates almost all forms of defenses.

[The Slumbering Angel]: In times of great need, Uriel, the Gatekeeper can—

“I would appreciate if you stopped doing that.”

Arwin’s eyes froze in place. Then, to his belief, he watched as the golden words shimmering in the air before him folded themselves up like a piece of origami until they vanished entirely.

His vision focused, finally slipping past where the words had been a moment before. The breath caught in his chest.

He was still in the Infernal Armory. And, crouched before him like a child inspecting an interesting bug, was the enormous suit of armor that he’d just passed out creating.

It — she — was enormous. Even crouching, Arwin had to crane his neck back to look at the armor’s helm. The pair of eyes within it burned with a brilliant molten gold light exactly like the letters that had been before him just a few moments ago.

“Godspit,” Arwin whispered. “I — you?”

“Yes, I do believe so,” the armor said in a voice that could have been confused for a pair of perfectly cut gems ringing melodiously against each other. It stood in stark, beautiful contrast to the cruel, sharp design that made up Uriel’s massive form.

Arwin’s mouth felt dry and clammy at the same time. It was at that moment that he realized there was something more than pain burning within him.

There was power. A river — no. An ocean of magic swirled within his body with a hungry roar. More than he’d ever held at once before. It was like a hundred achievements all mashed into a single storming orb.

How much power did I get for creating Uriel? I haven’t even had a chance to use any of it yet, but I somehow feel stronger than I did before.

“What exactly did you want me to stop?” Arwin asked carefully.

“Reading me like a book,” Uriel said. “I don’t imagine you would enjoy if someone peered into your innards, would you? Even if it was your maker.”

“I… yes. I suppose I wouldn’t,” Arwin said, still trying to find his words. “I didn’t expect you to be so… alive.”

“Whyever not?” Uriel asked. “You just created me. I would hope that you didn’t go into such a task hoping that you would fail.”

“Well, no. But the other Soul Guardian I made—”

“I,” Uriel said, her voice sharp and strong but not unkind, “am unlike anything you have ever created.”

There was an unmistakable note of pride in her voice. The kind of pride that could be found only in the voice of the king or someone who knew that, without a doubt, they were the pinnacle of their field. It was the kind of pride that could be measured only by the quality of the one who bore it. Such presence could be borne only by an impossibly great man — or an equally terrible one.  

“Somehow, I don’t doubt that,” Arwin said. He glanced around the room. The others were still all there as well. They laid strewn across the ground like dolls that had fallen from a child’s pack. Everyone was still breathing, but they were unconscious.

“They are safe,” Uriel said. “I did not move anyone. I do not possess a gentle touch.”

Arwin looked down at the massive, spiked gauntlets. “Did you want a gentle touch? I didn’t consider—”

“No,” Uriel replied. “I do not believe I have any interest in such a thing. There are others whose purpose is to be gentle.”

Arwin slowly pushed himself to his feet. Uriel rose as well. She barely even fit within the Infernal Armory. He also hadn’t missed the information that the Mesh had given him about the armor.

 Uriel serves no master.

“What is it you desire, then?” Arwin asked.

“You created me,” Uriel replied. “What purpose should I desire?”

“I’m not sure I can give you the answer to that,” Arwin replied. “You said it yourself. I’ve never worked on anything like you. You’re a hell of a lot more than a weapon. I think you’re about as close to any living being as anything else in this world. It isn’t for me to determine what you should desire.”

Uriel’s helm tilted to the side. Golden light shimmered behind the grate covering the mouth area of her helm, almost like the lips of some ethereal spirit within the armor curling up in a smile.

“Well spoken. To be honest, I need no guidance. I know my desires just as you know yours. But I did have to satisfy my curiosity. Such an interesting thing, curiosity. Were you aware that materials can have desires, but no true thought? We exist. We long. But until given life… we do not wonder. Isn’t that fascinating?” Uriel asked. “Perhaps it is not. But it fascinates me. I was only born a few minutes ago, after all. Does this mean you are my father?”

Arwin’s brow furrowed. “I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

“Nor am I,” Uriel said. “Arwin, then.”

“Arwin is good,” Arwin said.

How powerful is Uriel? I didn’t get a chance to finish reading her abilities, but even the few I saw seemed immensely powerful. There was no limiter on them. They scaled right with the strength of the people in the Devil’s Den.

 “Will I kill soon?” Uriel asked.

Arwin nearly choked on his own saliva. “What?”

“I know your thoughts and desires, just as I know mine,” Uriel said. She gestured to everyone else. “And not just yours. There is a war coming. It comes to this street.”

“I don’t know if I’d say it’s a war,” Arwin said. The idea of that made his stomach churn. This world had seen war enough. He had no desire to add to the casualty count any more than he had to. “But there is conflict coming, yes. If you know our desires, then you know what we seek.”

“The survival of the world. The survival of the Menagerie. The end of the Adventurer’s Guild.”

“Among other things,” Arwin said. “So I do not know if you will have to kill soon. Do you want to kill soon?”

“I do not know. I will tell you after I kill,” Uriel replied.

“After? Not if?”

Uriel stared at Arwin. Her molten gold eyes seemed to burn holes straight into his soul.

“After. You did not make me into this form so I would spare your opponents. I know your reluctance to cause more pain. But I am not the carrot to be offered in peace, Arwin. I am the stick. I am the blade drawn when your other attempts fail. That is why I did not move you. My hand will only raise when the only answer is death.”

“Was I the melodramatic one?” Arwin asked. “Or is that a Uriel special?”

To his surprise, Uriel let out a laugh.

“No. Wallace.”

“Of course,” Arwin said, sending a sidelong glance at the dwarf, who was snoring away in the corner of the armory. “Should have guessed. Please don’t go killing anyone that doesn’t need killing, though.”

“I am not deranged.”

“You never know,” Arwin said. “You did see who had a hand in making you, did you not?”

Gold shimmered behind Uriel’s helm once more. “A fair point. I must ponder it. Perhaps deranged is a subjective state. There is much that I do not yet know.”

“You’ll never be able to change that,” Arwin said. “Life isn’t meant to be understood. It’s meant to be lived.”

“Wise words,” Uriel said.

“They aren’t mine.”

 “I know,” Uriel replied.

Then she turned, lumbering toward the comparatively tiny door of the Infernal Armory to leave. The wall stretched itself open for her, but Uriel was still forced to lower herself to the ground and squeeze in order to fit into the main room.

Arwin watched her silently.

He made his way over to Lillia, crouching beside her and carefully scooping her off the ground. Her eyes didn’t even flutter. She was out cold — but the gentle rise and fall of her chest against his made it clear that she was just sleeping.

Then he sent a glance back at the massive suit of armor.

I feel a bit bad for the Infernal Armory. I don’t think it was expecting anything like this when I made the Devil’s Den its armor. She’s… intense.

The Infernal Armory’s wall opened with a rumble, granting a wide passage to the dark, empty, moonlit street beyond. Uriel straightened to her full height. Then she paused. The huge suit of armor turned to look back at Arwin as if a thought had just struck her.

“Is something wrong?” Arwin asked.

“You’re going to need to make a bigger tub,” Uriel said. “A much bigger tub.”

Then the wall closed behind Uriel, and the Infernal Armory was silent once more.