Chapter 232: Late-Night Hammering

Moon leaned closer to the holographic screen in front of his face in the dark room. Unknowingly, he started scratching his head violently.

"What the fuck did I just see?"

One second, the man floated between the city and the army; the next, the army was gone, and the screen was bright white.

That’s when the video ended.

"What kind of battle is this?" Moon felt irritated. "It isn’t even ten seconds long."

He looked at the statistics of the video, thinking it was a scam, but...

It was far from it...

Hundreds of billions of views and likes.

Comments so many they needed a lifetime to read every single one of them.

He decided to check the info of the video.

{I nearly died filming this, and I would have if not for Master Nizar’s protection.}

"Who the hell is Nizar?" Moon mumbled to himself.

He began slowing down the video in a desperate attempt to see what had actually happened.

x0.2

x0.1

x0.09

Gradually...

Slower and slower, ascenders fought at blinding speed and pace. The video had a free scale where he could slow it down as much as needed to be able to see what he had missed.

Moon tried to bring the video to the small point where everything was gone.

In the end.

"Fuck this, man." He gave up.

The best he could see was the man moving his hand forward.

He couldn’t see how he attacked, what he attacked with, or what exactly had happened to the army of undead.

If anything, it was unsettling.

Watching an entire army disappear in the blink of an eye without having the slightest ability to fight back or even understand what happened to them.

It was a frightening thing to a warrior.

Moon silently frowned, staring at the ceiling of his room.

After a moment, he brought the ring up again. He wanted to read some of the comments; maybe they understood what had happened.

He refused to believe that it was impossible to see exactly what he did.

Starting with the top comments.

{Master Nizar is undoubtedly the strongest in the Tower.} 99 years ago.

-Absolutely, no one dared challenge him.

-The Merit Order must have a few ancients of the same class.

-Not impossible, but who could compare to him?

{How can I join the church?} 96 years ago.

-You can’t.

-I tried but was rejected.

{Thanks to Master Nizar, the accursed necromancers have been gone for so long.} 37 years ago.

-We all owe this man.

-A man so humble, he never demanded a reward or glory.

{No one dared look down on the church since that day.} 22 years ago.

-That day alone was enough to turn the church into a major force.

-So many things changed because of a single person.

-We’re glad he’s not interested in power struggles.

Tsk~

Moon clicked his tongue. ’This is one guy I can’t afford to meet within my lifetime,’ he grumbled inwardly, not daring to voice out his thoughts.

He dismissed the window and spread his arms on the bed.

Mishu wasn’t in the room right now, and Moon had things to do tonight. He felt frustrated by the scale of power he found himself witnessing.

Awe-inspiring, but also enough to fill a man’s heart with desperation.

Merit Order... Assault Facility... Church of the Sun...

These three forces would come after him one day. Moon didn’t believe a miracle would come, but he knew he needed to stay away from them until he was at least strong enough to explain himself.

He didn’t want to die without knowing what hit him.

Yet he now had three individuals from two of the three forces on his side in this trial.

Moon stood up and started packing his things again; he packed his armor and weapons as well and hung them on his back.

Only time would give him answers.

For now, he needed to stick to his routine while he could.

Walking out of his room, Moon started searching around the palace before running into a familiar face.

"You awake too?" Dorbish said.

Moon nodded. "Just woke up now."

Moon studied Dorbish, noticing a hammer and a piece of plate armor. He wasn’t wearing his armor or pyjamas now, but a leather apron over a white shirt. "You’re doing some metalwork too?" he asked.

"I didn’t get to touch a hammer since the day I ascended," Dorbish replied with a sigh.

Moon remembered the clan Dorbish came from was, in essence, a lineage of blacksmiths.

He scratched his head. "Do you know where I can find the forge here?" Moon asked.

Dorbish nodded. "It took me a while to find it, though," he said before signalling for Moon to follow him.

Going into a corridor behind the main flight of stairs that led to a small flight of stairs going down.

Moon followed Dorbish along the stone corridors before finally... he started sensing the heat.

"I started the furnace, if you’re wondering," Dorbish added to Moon, who was indeed wondering.

Soon, Moon found himself in a vast hall with rows of anvils and furnaces. Tools hung around each working space.

"Hoo..." he exclaimed in surprise.

It looked too big compared to Ed’s private place. Yet, the flame didn’t feel as hot, far from being comparable to the weird flames he had seen in Hall 3.

Here, the furnace was made of thick clay, and large chunks of wood were burning slowly in a seemingly compact space.

Dorbish walked closer to the furnace before starting to blow the flames. He threw the piece of metal he had been holding onto inside.

Moon watched with eyes radiating curiosity. "Is that how your fire works around here?" he asked.

Dorbish nodded. "If you don’t have special means of producing flame, this is the only way."

After a moment, Dorbish turned to Moon. "Do you have experience with this, or are you just here to test your luck?" he asked.

Moon laid down his bag in a corner of the room. Seeing so many tools here, he didn’t want to dirty the things Ed had given him.

He took off his shirt as well and picked one of the leather aprons hanging on the wall.

"I have some experience, but not with the flames," Moon said while picking up the hammer.

Dorbish nodded in understanding. "You have heat resistance?" he asked.

Moon looked around the furnace that didn’t even feel hot to him after experiencing the red, violent flames Ed kept almost under his bed.

The flame was docile compared to the one he was familiar with.

Nodding, "Yeah, got inferior heat resistance recently," Moon said.

One of many things he had tried to acquire but failed; at least one of them finally worked.

Soon, Dorbish brought out a piece of metal from the furnace, one different from the plate he had thrown just now.

He placed it on the anvil, giving Moon, who was wearing the apron over nothing, a look.

"Your body seems to be in a much better state than it was at first."

Moon’s lips crept to one side with half a heavy smile. "Power of cheesecake."

Dorbish smiled and nodded.

Ting~Tang

Ting~Tang

The two of them silently raised their hammers and started honing the metal all night long.