Chapter 389

“You look terrible.”

“Thanks for that.”

“I’m serious. Did you sleep even a little bit last night?” Thera asked, looking at Ben’s exhausted form with blatant worry.

“Technically.”

“So you were up all night talking with your god, of course you were. But you don’t usually look so bad after it.”

“Er, it was a slightly more involved conversation than usual, don’t pay it too much mind,” He explained, not wanting to go into too much detail. There was no need to make her think about what another world was going through with their own’s end so close at hand. “Anyway, should we head off? Don’t want to leave them waiting.”

She gave him a suspicious look, feeling like there was more being left unsaid but agreed nonetheless as they left the embassy and made their way through the streets, getting to the head of the craftsman’s guild.

The building itself was impressive, as were the ones around it. They all stood high, the walls being made of enchanted glass to keep a constant level of light coming through them for the people working within to enjoy and making the total of it an architectural marvel.

The ones surrounding it were much the same too, only serving a purpose beyond administrative work. In a similar vein to the magic towers, the land they found themselves in also had a place that hoarded the knowledge of its focus, with six large buildings each devoted to differing crafting-related topics and filled to the brim with books.

It was a place he fully intended to make use of while he was there amongst everything else he’d planned on doing, but it wasn’t the focus for the time being as they instead saw Falk waiting for them out front as they both rushed over.

“So how’d it go boy?” Was the first thing he wanted to know, with Ben’s defeated look being enough of an answer for anyone. “Ah well, don’t let it get you down, these things are far from easy.”

“I know, but they could stand to be a little easier,” He grumbled as Thera spoke up.

“And is aunty not with you?”

“She’s with your mother right now. I’m sure you can imagine but Pel is having a bit of a hectic time with everything going on so she’s there to be support before things get too bad.”

“Mmh, well I’ll go through to see them both in a day or two then. I need to talk to mom anyway.”

“In that case let me know when you want to head over,” Ben told her. “I need to order a bunch of diamond sheets from your dad. I promised Delair some games and I have something I need to test out too.”

“Ah, I’m going to be having a bit of a personal talk with her so if you just tell me what you need I’ll make sure to bring them back,” She said, not looking at him as she did.

Even turned away though, it didn’t keep either Ben nor Falk from noticing her face twinkle in the light as they each wondered just what sort of talk they were going to have, but ultimately left the matter alone as they focused on their own goal for the day.

“So are we heading out soon?”

“Just waiting on one more,” Falk told them. “When I told him you’d be joining us he wanted to meet up with you but since he’s busy and already late it might be a bit.”

Before either of them could ask just who it was he was talking about though, a voice called out to them as the door of the guild opened, with the head of it all, Iberu, walking out.

“Sorry, sorry for the holdup. It’s lovely to see you both again,” The troll hybrid told them, smiling at them all despite the atmosphere filling the city as Ben and Thera returned the greeting.

“It’s no worries, but don’t you have more important things to do than to go around with us?” Ben asked. He couldn’t imagine the head of the guild having the sort of free time that would allow such a break, especially not with an invasion point on his doorstep, but the man just waved away the question.

“You’re coming out to see my pet project and since you’ll be on the reserve team to help if anything goes wrong, how could I not? Besides, I could use a bit of a break from time to time so let’s head out.”

“Bah, you just want to leave things to your underlings,” Falk said, not believing him as he laughed.

“If I don’t give them any practice with my work then they’ll never be able to handle it when I’m gone. Besides, this is important. I’m leading around someone who’s both an awakened craftsman and enchanter if the rumours are to be believed. Speaking of, lovely to see you survived Ben, I was thrilled when I got the news.”

“And I was thrilled to live, it’s nice to see you again too Iberu.”

From there they walked through town, the topic sticking closely to their main focus and leaving Thera bored from the technical talk as they discussed the art of crafting as a whole, along with the finer points where their work was put into practice.

Ben was thrilled to learn that like himself, Iberu had the crafting skill, and at the ninth level on top of it. Even more interesting was what other skill he had with it. Magic smithing.

It seemed that the guild leader had taken advantage of the system in the early days of his training, and that fact let him reach his current heights. Crafting was essentially a combined skill, meaning that once a person had it, they couldn’t gain the individual skills that made it up. However, there was a workaround to that. If a person already had a crafting-type skill and then trained in multiple ones they didn’t, they could still get the crafting skill normally.

By having both, it let his smithing reach beyond its expected limits, as well as gave a certain level of ease in raising crafting too, but it still wasn’t as easy as it sounded. Even though it could be done, already having smithing did increase the difficulty in getting the other. It spoke to the level of work Iberu put in to get where he was in life.

“But the skill synergy made it worth the effort,” Iberu told them with a smile. “And getting to the ninth level of crafting on top of it gave me that convenient bit of analysis to go with it. Plus it makes things easier for understanding the goings on in the rest of the guild.”

“And I take it one of the skills it awakened with was enchanting, right? You did show off that bit during the contest.”

“Ha, that it did. That and my fire magic went into it and it’s been paying off ever since, even if I don’t get to enjoy it as much as I once did. Guild work does keep me a bit distant from my forge, but I still enjoy putting the time in where I can.”

From there the conversation took a turn to the projects Ben had been working on since he’d regained his freedom until they finally reached their destination. The edge of the city and the beginning of the coming battlefield.

It was the closest he’d been to any of the invasion points and saw it was far bigger than he’d initially thought, the beam of light leaving a roughly two-hundred-meter circle on the ground, waiting for the day it would pour out its death and destruction, but there was plenty of other things to see too.

The land had been not only cleared, but raised around the coming gate to prepare for the expected battle, giving them the advantage of a high ground as armies were already getting set up, different groups covering the areas they were responsible for as thousands of people were out just to set up their traps, defenses, and various fortifications, with untold tens or hundreds of thousands more all ready to come when the day would finally arrive.

Farther from the center were some medical areas for on-site treatment, but the majority of cases would be going to the opposite side of the city, a sturdy defense set up and waiting for anyone they would need to take, or else through the world’s own gate network, nations that didn’t have the threat on their doorsteps not only taking in those who would be displaced, but taking care of what wounded they could.

Seeing it up close, Ben couldn’t help but think of the scale of what was coming through, and the level of logistics needed to have any hope of dealing with it. For a month straight there would be constant bodies coming out in a wave as each army wouldn’t even have time to deal with their dead. Any fighter that managed to survive long enough would need to do their best to get out of the fray for whatever bit of rest they could while new ones would need to go in to replace them. It all just seemed like chaos, and right at the back of it was exactly where he would be.

At the edge of town was the weapon it seemed the craftsman’s guild was placing their hopes into. A behemoth that looked more like a building, it had a barrel square at its front with an opening as wide as he was tall with a clear line of fire to the invasion point, the only thing that seemed ready for whatever was to come, even as he had trouble keeping his eyes on it.

“So that’s the weapon that will end the war, huh? It feels hard to look at, was it enchanted to make people want to keep their eyes off it?” He muttered, mostly to himself but still getting a response.

“Quick on the uptake, aren’t you?” Iberu said. “It can be fought past of course, but we’re hoping that anything rushing from the gates won’t have the presence of mind if they happen to get too close somehow and just rush by it. I’ve put all of my resources into making this and some of the best minds the guild had to offer spent the last twenty years working on and refining the idea. We admittedly wish we had more time on it but then who doesn’t? If this shows its value here then we can have each nation and faith devote the resources needed to making more for as many gates as we can with the time we have. It won’t be easy, but then ensuring the future was never going to be.”

“And I don’t suppose I’ll be able to get my hands on the blueprints at all, could I?” Ben asked, already salivating as he looked at it with any fear for the future forgotten. “You know, since I’m here to help in case anything goes wrong and all?”

“You’ll ideally be a backline worker with your teacher in the event that an emergency crops up, we do have a number of people who have the hands-on experience putting it together after all, but yes, of course I’ll supply you with the blueprints when we get back.”

“Very cool,” All he wanted to do was crack it open to see what made it tick, but he’d settle for what he could get. Even his mana sense alone made him want to see more of it, the dense weave of enchantments throughout it being enough to captivate him, with his mind only pulling away from it as he felt something squeeze his hand.

Even still, it took a second to take his eyes off of it to see Thera, her eyes just as glued to it as his were, only with a deep look of discomfort instead of his curiosity.

“What’s up?”

“Doesn’t something feel a little weird to you?” She asked, an edge in her voice he wasn’t used to hearing.

“Weird?”

“I mean, it just feels, I don’t know, bad?”

She couldn’t put it into words, but as soon as she’d seen the weapon she hadn’t liked it. Just being close was prickling at her skin as she tried to put a finger on what was bothering her about it, only for the reason to elude her entirely.

It was a worry she’d only meant to share with Ben, but her uncle and Iberu were close enough to hear as well, with the latter giving her a comforting smile.

“It is a tool meant to deal untold death and destruction in an area with everyone exuding their dread, it’s not shocking being here might leave you a little uncomfortable. I think that’s enough for a look anyway, why don’t we start heading back and we can get you those blueprints?”

“Ah, maybe that’s for the best right now.”

Ben only wanted to look into it deeper but he understood the discomfort well enough. If the mood of every town and city in the world was bad as people counted down the days, it was at its absolute worst at the invasion points. Everyone who was there was working knowing that they’d be closer to the front lines than anyone would want to be, facing something that nobody could be asked to take on if the stakes weren’t so high. When he thought about it in those terms then he couldn’t help but feel prickly too, but as they started walking back Iberu came in to distract him from his thoughts.

“Ah, by the way Ben, I never did thank you for writing out those reports I requested. I actually have someone who’s interested in talking about ritual magic with you if you might have some time in a few days?”

“Oh, sure, I don’t mind. I was just planning on spending my free time at the library so where should I meet them?”

“If you don’t mind an interruption, if you’d just leave your name at the front desk then the librarian can point them to you when they get here.”

“Sounds good, and in that case do you mind if I make a little request myself?”

“It depends, but I’ll at least hear it.”

“I don’t think it’s anything objectionable. We’re still waiting for the main forces that are covering this point to arrive, right? When they get here I was thinking of setting up a stand to do some pro-bono work. Just wanted to make sure that was cool first.”

“Ha, I’m not going to turn down anyone who’s going to do some free work to help my home. I think most people are showing up a week before things kick off so if you want to then be my guest. I’ll write up a permit for you so nobody will give you any trouble.”

“Awesome, thanks.”

It wasn’t much, but since he could he figured he’d do some free enchanting for armours and weapons. All it cost him was his mana after all and it had the potential to save some lives. No matter how little it was in comparison to what any soldier might do, it was a way to put some effort toward the good of the world. He might as well do what he could.

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