Rise of the Living Forge

Chapter 46: Topple

Lillia snapped her fingers and a shadow shot out from the darkness, wrapping around Rodrick’s leg and yanking him to the side with a surprised yelp a moment before his head could get turned into a fine bloody mist by the swinging sword.

Arwin stumbled to his feet, his head still ringing. Even the glancing blow had been enough to completely knock him out of sorts. Anna raced up to him, slapping her palm against his shoulder.

Healing energy rushed into him, pushing the dizziness back. Arwin sprinted back into the fight, not even spending the time to give Anna a grateful nod. The golem was already rearing back to swing at Lillia and Rodrick again.

He swung his hammer with a roar, bringing it crashing into the golem’s side whilst using the full force of [Scourge]. A powerful shockwave ran up his arms as his hammer struck home, crashing through the golem’s body.

For a brief instant, a flicker of green caught Arwin’s eye. A gemstone, roughly the size of his fist, rested directly in the center of the monster’s chest.

“The core is in the middle of its body!” Arwin roared, jumping back to avoid getting crumpled like a tin can by the golem’s sword. “One of you need to finish it off! If I kill it, you’ll barely get any rewards!”

“I’ll be honest, I’m a little more concerned with not dying,” Rodrick yelled back.

“You’ll not die more often if you get stronger.”

The golem’s limbs ground against each other as it stomped toward Arwin. Tremors ran through the ground with every step it took, and Arwin was forced to use [Scourge] to empower his feet and jump out of the way of a devastating sword swing.

Stone had already started rolling up the monster’s body, gathering and concealing the core once more. Arwin gritted his teeth. The golem wasn’t exactly a sapient monster, but it could adapt. It wasn’t going to sit around and let him wail on it.

“I’m going to reveal the core again,” Arwin said. “Reya, slow it down as soon as I land the hit. Rodrick, finish it off. I’ll make sure its attention is on me.”

He didn’t wait for any confirmations. Arwin activated [Arsenal] and dismissed his armor and hammer before bursting into motion. Without the heavy equipment, Arwin dove under the golem’s next blow and rolled to his feet. He summoned his hammer back to his hands and armor to his body as he rose and brought his hammer up into the golem’s chest.

Stone shattered and rained against the wall behind the golem, revealing the shimmering core in the center of its chest. The golem brought a fist hurtling toward Arwin. He’d put himself in a good position to hit the monster, but the same worked in the other direction.

Rodrick ran forward, sword ignited with burning light as he swung it at the core, but it wasn’t going to hit in time to stop the rocky fist from colliding with its target.

Arwin yanked his hand up, ripping his sleeve back and shoving the bracelet into his mouth. He bit down on the metal an instant before the golem’s fist slammed into him like a freight train.

With just [Indomitable Bulwark], Arwin’s body wouldn’t have been able to handle the blow. The golem was too large, and its full force was directed straight into Arwin’s chest. But, as the fist collided, energy flooded through his body.

The strike threw Arwin back like a discarded toy, sending him hurtling across the room and crashing into the wall at the far end. He slid down it, dust and debris raining around him.

Another wave of blue energy bound the golem. The monster slammed to a halt just as Rodrick’s sword struck the green gemstone with a high-pitched clink. Cracks shot through the gemstone and it shattered, letting out a flash of faint light. The entire golem crumbled, stumbling forward and collapsing into a large pile of debris.

“Arwin!” Lillia yelled, running up to his side – and skidding to a halt as he rose. Her eyes went wide in disbelief.

Arwin was uninjured. He could feel the magic from the bracelet already leaving his body, unable to handle the sheer force it had just absorbed for him. He shook his arms off, then grinned. “I’m fine.”

“What? How?” Anna demanded, running up beside Lillia. “You should be dead!”

“I’m a tough nut to crack,” Arwin said with a shrug. He was pleased to find that his armor wasn’t too damaged from the strike either – his body had failed to give way even slightly, so while it had warped a bit around him, it was still roughly in the right shape.

Before anyone could say anything else, the Mesh swirled before Arwin.

Achievement: [Topple the Strong] has been earned.

[Topple the Strong] – Awarded for defeating an opponent one full Tier above you. Effects: One skill in your next Skill Selection has been upgraded to Unique. This achievement will be consumed upon choosing your next skill.

A huge grin split Arwin’s face. Even if they got absolutely nothing else from the dungeon, this single achievement made everything worth it. The value of upgrading upcoming skills had already been proven time and time again to be immense.

“Whoa,” Rodrick breathed, staring into the air before him in mute awe.

“What?” Anna asked. “What happened? Are you okay?”

“I got an Achievement,” Rodrick said. “For killing a Golem with one strike.”

“Congratulations. What’s it do?” Arwin asked., grateful for a way to switch the topic away from himself.

“It lets me upgrade one of my skills,” Rodrick replied absent-mindedly, his gaze still fixed on the air before him. “And I got a pretty damn good upgrade out of it. My Empowered Strike now carries on into my next two attacks. That’ll be pretty useful, since using it once draws pretty much all my magical energy.”

“I didn’t get anything this time around, but I barely did anything to help in the fight so it’s not much of a surprise,” Anna said. She gave Arwin one last look before turning away from him. “What about you, Reya?”

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Reya nodded mutely. She swallowed, then licked her lips. “I – yeah. I got something.”

“An achievement?” Rodrick asked.

“No. A Title.”

All of them froze. Rodrick drew in a sharp breath, letting it out in a whistle. Getting Achievements was incredibly important, but they were always consumed at some point. Titles, on the other hand, were arguably the most powerful boons that anyone could get.

Barring the most extreme circumstances, Titles were permanent. Their benefits could range from borderline useless to incredibly powerful, but they never left. Every single title was immensely valuable. To get one this early was huge for Reya.

“What does it do?” Anna asked, her eyes wide with shock. “Is it a good one? I can’t believe you got a Title at Apprentice 1. That’s incredible. That could set your entire future up for you.”

“Don’t forget she got it by helping kill something more than twice her Tier,” Rodrick pointed out. “She actually helped take it out, too. It wasn’t just fed to her. That’s not an easy feat to replicate.”

“Stop yapping and let me hear what the Title is,” Lillia said. She paused, then reddened. “Assuming you want to say, of course. You don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to, Reya.”

“I think it’s fine,” Reya said with a hurried shake of her head. “I was just distracted reading it. It’s called Gaiac Heart.”

“What’s it do?” Arwin asked, a flash of concern passing through him. Not every Title was always beneficial. It was incredibly rare, but it wasn’t impossible to get a detrimental effect from them. Anything that had the chance to affect the heart was a little worrying.

Reya swallowed before speaking again. “It’s a passive that draws on my magical energy whenever I get injured, healing slowly depending on how bad the damage is.”

“Oh, shit,” Anna whispered. “That’s absolutely ridiculous. A healing passive?”

“A very slow one,” Reya said, but that did little to reduce the significance of the ability.

“That’s quite the Title,” Arwin said. “It’ll serve you well. I’ve seen a lot of them, and I can say without a doubt that defensive and restorative Titles are almost always the best ones you can get. Even if it’s just a small amount, that’s going to be useful for as long as you live.”

“Might make you live longer too,” Anna mused. “Aging is just destruction of the body. You might stay young for longer without even having to reach the higher Tiers and slow your aging by infusing yourself with magic.”

“Whoa. I didn’t even think of that,” Reya said, blinking in surprise. She touched her face, as if trying to see if she’d suddenly grown younger. “How come I got a Title when the rest of you got Achievements?”

“Questioning the Mesh is a pretty pointless task,” Arwin said. “It does what it wants. If I had to venture a guess, I’d say it’s because the difference in your abilities and those of the golem was really large, even compared to the rest of us. You basically just started fighting monsters, while everyone else here has been at it for at least a little while.”

“It’s too bad we can’t replicate the scenario by fighting some real big bad monster ourselves,” Rodrick mused, rubbing his chin. “I’d quite fancy a Title myself.”

“You could. Go try to beat up the Wyrm,” Anna said with a snort of laughter. “See how it goes for you.”

Rodrick grimaced and wasted no time in shaking his head. “No thanks. I choose life.”

Lillia didn’t mention if she’d gotten anything from the fight and nobody pressed her on it. Arwin suspected she’d likely gotten a skill advancement similar to what he had, but reading the Mesh’s moves was impossible. It was possible she’d gotten nothing. Either way, they all had enough secrets to know not to go prying into those of others. When information wasn’t offered, it wasn’t asked for.

“We’ll have more than enough time to get ourselves Titles and Achievements in the future,” Arwin said, approaching the remains of the golem and kneeling beside them. He pushed through the rubble and pulled out one of the faintly glowing crystals. To his disappointment, it crumbled to dust in his hand. Evidently, it had been integrally tied to the golem.

Arwin tried picking up a few more crystals. They all ended in the same way. Cursing under his breath, he rose to his feet. He stepped over the monster’s remains and headed over to the waterfall, stepping through the rushing water.

The frown on his face vanished, replaced by a delighted grin. Resting in a small pile in a small cave were two dozen crystals, polished and waiting for an owner. They were all around an inch wide and two to three inches long.

He hadn’t been left empty handed by the mesh. The ground beneath the crystals was mushy, and he was able to pull each one out without too much difficulty.

Arwin scooped them into his arms and walked back through the waterfall. He turned one of them over in his hand, watching the light reflect off the walls. “And I got what I was looking for as well.”

“The crystals?” Anna asked.

“I think I can use them,” Arwin said with a nod.

If I had a pickaxe, I’d consider trying to take some of the crystal in the walls as well. That would have a pretty high chance of attracting more attention than we want, though. This is more than enough to work with for now. I couldn’t carry more if I wanted to.

“So, do we try to venture any deeper?” Anna asked while Arwin worked to collect the crystals.

“I don’t think it would be wise,” Lillia said, adjusting her grip on the tentacle tucked under her arm. “We’ve already gotten some pretty good rewards from going this deep, and the golem was already a pretty tough fight. Arwin’s armor is already pretty damaged, so pushing further could mean biting off more than we can chew.”

“I agree,” Reya said. “I don’t think we should rush things. We should reset, get used to our new benefits, and let Arwin fix up his armor.”

And make my hammer. If I can figure out how to use this crystal, I bet it could be quite effective. With how hard it was to damage them, they’d definitely pack a significant punch. I’ll probably need to use a different material for the handle of the hammer if I don’t want to vibrate myself to death every time I hit something.

“No need to push ourselves farther.” Arwin straightened back up, every pocket he had completely stuffed full of crystals. “We can all be pretty proud of our performance. Before we head out – Anna, how is it that your class gets strength?”

“Mostly through combat. It’s really hard to get energy as a healer,” Anna said with a frown. “I’ve got to participate in the fight, but I don’t have any good ways to damage monsters. My healing counts, but the severity of the wound has to be pretty nasty for it to give a huge boost. Since I don’t have the buffs or benefits that other combat classes have, I’m more liable to get chopped in half when I try to fight. It’s okay, though. I get a really small amount just from standing around and keeping everyone safe.”

Arwin shook his head. “That’s not going to be acceptable in the long run, and I’m not particularly partial to standing around and letting myself get nasty cuts so you can get levels.”

“I doubt that would work anyway,” Anna said. “The Mesh wouldn’t recognize healing self-inflicted wounds as dangerous in most circumstances.”

“Right. We can’t have you far weaker than the rest of us in the span of a few weeks, so we’ll have to do something about that,” Arwin said.

“A few weeks? Just how aggressively are you planning to push us?” Anna asked with a nervous laugh. “It’s not like I can do much about it anyway. The only way for me to safely participate in a fight would be to get close, and my magic doesn’t work on myself. I’m just a liability unless you guys get really cut up.”

“Not if we hold the monster down for you,” Arwin said.

“That’s an assisted kill, though,” Anna said. “You’d lose so much energy for doing it, and I’d barely get any because you basically fed it to me. The Mesh only awards challenge.”

“I’d say it’s a good bit of challenge to get close enough to a monster that can kill you in one blow,” Arwin said with a dry laugh. “Besides, Reya got a good bit of energy from sitting in the back. We’ll be ensuring you get energy as well from here on out. We don’t need an under leveled healer.”

Anna bit the insides of her cheeks. “That’s a lot of energy you’d be wasting.”

“Not my energy. I don’t get shit for killing things,” Arwin said with a snort. “What about you, Rodrick? Complaints?”

“Are you kidding? No way in the Nine Underlands. I’d do it for Anna myself if I thought I could actually manage it safely,” Rodrick said with an eager grin. “She’s too damn polite to say yes, but I’ll do it for her. Thank you. We’ll gladly do as you ask.”

“Good,” Arwin said. “Let’s get going, then. I’ve got some armor to repair and some new toys to play with. I think I’m going to try to make myself a hammer.”