Chapter 205: The Forge Master’s Gift (1)

Vex pulled the heavy cloth away, and Nathan stopped breathing.

Sitting on a bed of dark velvet was a single arrow. The shaft was bone-white, completely smooth, and covered from end to end in tiny, glowing runes that actually seemed to shift when Nathan didn’t look directly at them. But it was the arrowhead that made the hair on his arms stand up. It was a jagged shard of pure, compressed darkness that gave off a freezing, ugly energy.

"I took the pieces of the Emissary you killed in the Shattered Throne," Vex said. Her voice was raspy, and she looked exhausted. Dark circles hung under her red eyes. "I spent the last few weeks breaking the material down and folding it into this."

She pointed a calloused finger at the dark arrowhead. "It is designed to punch straight through the Shepherd’s personal magic. It disrupts his frequency. But you only get one shot. If you miss, I can’t make another one."

Nathan reached out and carefully picked up the arrow. It was surprisingly warm to the touch. It hummed in his grip like a live wire. "Vex, this is incredible."

"It’s highly unstable," Vex corrected him, crossing her muscular arms. "But if you are actually going to walk into the Shepherd’s front door, you need a weapon that can put a permanent hole in him. Now put it away. We have a lot more work to do."

She turned and slapped her hand against her massive iron anvil. "Empty your bags, Cross. I need materials. Every piece of Legendary scrap, every boss drop, every rare crystal you have been hoarding. If we are doing this, I’m emptying the tank."

Nathan opened his system inventory. He started pulling items out and piling them on the heavy workbench.

He set down the Ashen Remnant they pulled from the dying World. Then the glowing Leviathan’s Tear. Then the heavy, magical Broken Crown Fragment from Corvus’s Throne. He added rare metals from the Iron Horde, ice crystals from the Frozen Throne, and deep-sea scales from the Crimson Depths.

Vex just stared at the pile. Her fire spirit, Ember, stopped flying around the room and hovered perfectly still, looking at the glowing loot.

"I have never had this much raw power on my table at the exact same time," Vex whispered, shaking her head. She looked up at Nathan, her eyes wide. "If I do this right, I can build you gear that will make the Cleansing look like a training drill."

"I have something else," Smithy said, stepping out of the shadows near the door.

He walked up to the workbench and pulled a small, thick leather book from his jacket. He set it down next to the glowing Leviathan’s Tear. "I’ve been holding onto this since the Court fell. It is an old forging manual from the ancient empire. It has crafting methods the TCA doesn’t even know exist."

Vex wiped her hands on her apron, picked up the book, and flipped through the yellow pages. Her red eyes scanned the text, reading faster and faster. Then, she let out a sharp, loud laugh.

"You sneaky bastard," Vex said, looking up at Smithy with total shock. "This changes everything. These old formulas let me weave Tower magic directly into the armor plating. Your gear will actually be stronger inside a Tower World than it is out here."

"I stole it from Fester’s private desk right before I left," Smithy said with a small shrug. "I figured it would come in handy eventually."

Vex slapped the book shut. "Give me exactly one week. I need everyone’s exact measurements before you leave this room. Get out of my forge and go train."

The next seven days passed in a total blur of sweat and bruised muscles.

Nathan spent every waking hour in the guild’s training yard with his team. He pushed his new B-Rank mana core to its absolute limit, firing arrows until his fingers bled and healed, over and over again.

Mirko tested her new C-Rank strength. She was taller now, her hits carrying the weight of a falling boulder. She sparred with Garrett, their heavy weapons crashing together hard enough to shake the dust out of the yard’s walls.

Kuro didn’t spar. She just practiced moving. She slipped through the shadows of the training dummies, leaving deep cuts in the wood without making a single sound. Shiro spent hours learning how to control her new golden dragon wings, hovering in the air and practicing precision strikes with her golden fire.

Dillon and Cloudy ran aerial drills, focusing on speed. Elise stood in the center of the yard, pushing her ice magic to freeze moving targets while her massive Frost Golem guarded her back.

And Smithy stayed down in the basement. He helped Vex translate the old empire text, his insider knowledge of the Court’s secrets proving to be the missing puzzle piece for the forge master. Nathan watched him work a few times. Smithy wasn’t the same angry, broken guy they had fought in the flooded cathedral. He had found a place to belong.

During the quiet hours, Nathan and Elise found time to just sit together. They shared quiet meals in the empty guild kitchen. They took short walks through the capital streets when the sun went down. They didn’t talk about the kiss on the roof. They didn’t need to. It hung between them—a silent, heavy promise that they were both going to make it back alive.

On the seventh night, Vex finally sent a runner upstairs to get them.

The whole team crowded into the hot, noisy forge. Vex stood proudly behind a long wooden table covered by a dark sheet. She looked terrible. Her eyes were completely bloodshot, and she looked like she hadn’t slept in a week. But she was grinning.

"Before we get to the heavy artillery," Vex said, pointing a finger at Smithy. "Step up here."

Smithy looked confused, but he walked to the front of the table.

"You fought with this team. You bled with them," Vex said gruffly. "But you’re still walking around in standard-issue TCA garbage. Put this on."