Entering the forge

The kingdom, Belzoheim was currently under the rule of the Lovecrafts. John and Lois Lovecraft were the Elf king and queen. They were known to be people of compassion, humility, and integrity. John Lovecraft was a good king to his subjects and a brutal ruler to his enemies while Lois Lovecraft was like a motherly figure to everyone under her rule.

They had four children. The eldest daughter was Alina Lovecraft. She was the heir to the throne. Elven customs did not stop women from becoming the rulers of the kingdom, in fact it was encouraged as women were more logical and calm-headed than men. Alina was already beloved by everyone and people already knew she would become the new ruler after her father and they were looking forward to that day. She had the rare life ether attribute and was known to be the best healer in all of Belzoheim.

The second child was Jeth Lovecraft. He was the general of the elven army. He was known to be a bloodthirsty man when he was on the battlefield. He had the wood ether attribute which made him a formidable foe on the battlefield. It was rumored that during a battle against over three hundred renegade soldiers that were lured by the human side, General Jeth summoned several plants that shot giant pea-looking balls, ones that breathed fire, plants that shot giant icy spheres, a purple flower that looked like flytrap that swallowed them whole and others. After such a sight, he was called "Green death".

The third child was Regallas Lovecraft and he was the only one who managed to learn the workings behind ether-technology despite being an elf. In Belzoheim, though the elves were the supreme race, the dwarves were the ones that helped construct most of their technology so they were highly respected in the society. Regallas despite being an elf was born with the ability to shape his wooden attribute like it was metal, he could morph the attributes and make a gun that worked exactly how a gun that was made of metal would work. He was also an excellent blacksmith.

The last child of the Lovecrafts was named Tife Lovecraft. She was an adorable little fairy. It is said that one in five thousand elves can give birth to a fairy. They were really rare and it was a joy for the Lovecraft family to give birth to a fairy as they were able to contract with spirits. Spirits were being that governed the laws of nature. There were volcanic spirits, forest spirits, ocean spirits, tundra spirits, sky spirits, and so on. Tife contracted a sky spirit at a young age. She was now able to wield hail, lightning, and other phenomena alongside her wood attribute. She was going to be powerful when she was as old as her sister who was already over two hundred years of age.

As elves had a longer life span to live, their age counted differently, Alina who was two hundred and thirty-seven years of age would be like someone who was in her early twenties and so was Jeth while Regallas would be in his teens and lastly Tife was about to go through puberty.

Licht and Midas listened as Daren told them everything to know about the royal family and Licht was quite curious as all of the Lovecraft spawns seemed intriguing but it still gave him no hint as to where his fragment was. The oddest thing was he could not feel his fragment at the center of the city which is where the Royal palace was but toward the north.

He chose to investigate such a phenomenon the next day. After their stroll, they decided to return back to the inn so they could rest and prepare for the day ahead of them.

Daybreak came and once again, Licht and Midas left the inn after eating breakfast, it seems that after yesterday's scare, the inn owner chose to be nice to these humans.

They headed out in the direction of the fragment and after walking for at least thirty minutes, they came across a huge blacksmith forge. Of course, it was still smaller than the actual dwarven forge but it was still huge. Licht and Midas chose to walk in and they met an elven male standing like a receptionist.

"May I ask what you require here, humans?" As he uttered the word humans, there was clear disgust in his mouth.

"We are here to check if there are any suitable weapons for us and if there are, we'd love to purchase them" Midas chose to speak for Licht while Licht continued staring inside. Before the elven receptionist even had the chance to reply, Licht strutted inwards without a care in the world.

"Hey, you can't go in there without my permission" The elf went forward to block Licht as he summoned a three-meter tall gate made of wood. Licht waved his hands, sending the elf flying with the help of wind, and then waved his hands again, the gate was sliced in half by a wind blade.

As Licht was walking in, sounds of hitting metals kept reverberating from the rooms around him but Licht did not stop, he walked till he reached the biggest door, he paused for a moment and pushed the door open.

As he walked in with Midas behind him, he saw a massive hall. In the hall there was a bed on the right-hand side and on the left-hand side was a forge while in the center of the room was a massive table like a study. This was an odd sight to see in a forge but Licht was staring at the woman laying on the bed, as he walked toward the woman on the bed, black wood grew from the ground and bound both Licht and Midas. Midas tried but could not break out of it despite being a basic green rank which means the person that bound them was above basic green rank, or so he thought while Licht looked at his binds and then looked at the forge.

He saw a blond elf with blue eyes that was lanky but built with muscles confidently smiling at them. The elf said "I do not know how you managed to get into the forge without alarming everyone or even opening the door made from harkanium but this is where you stop, human"

The bindings around Licht melted back into the ground and he said "I did not know I will find another person with emperor's potential here but you are not the reason why I came here" In Licht's eyes the blond elf had a faint golden aura that emanated from him. The reason Licht did not see it clearly with Midas was that he was too weak to show forth his potential, while this elf had been cultivating and was currently at basic green rank. The emperor's potential was one of the mysteries of this world as people could not see it or even measure it, all they knew was that certain individuals cultivated quite quickly and were stronger than people of the same rank they were on.

Licht's theory as to why he could see the aura around them was that Emperor's potential had to do with order which was why people with the emperor's potential had a golden aura around them and not any other color.

Licht looked at Midas and the blond elf and the golden aura around both of them were practically similar. He smiled and said "Midas, it seems you've finally met your match"

Midas understood what Licht meant and the bindings around him caught fire, green fire then melted into the ground.