Blacksmith

Author's note: So, I deleted a chapter today that was titled Torture. The reason I did this was because the chapter was crap. It was a continuation of the chapter, Double Date. After rereading it, I wanted to throw up. I guess my change in writing style gives me more creativity, but it decreases my logic. For example, the Blood Forest was entirely thought up by my more creative side. The type of chapter Torture was supposed to be was something that pulls all the strings set up over the course of this book, but it wound up in a knot more tangled than earbud cables. It was painful, but I had to throw it back on the drawing board. For now, I'll focus on Doevm's story and come back to Thomas's story. I apologize. *sigh* back to the story.

In the center of the Blood Forest, the trees seemed to stop, as if they hit an invisible barrier. Not even a blade of grass grew within the space of a about a thousand feet in radius. In that area similar to the eye of a storm, there was a single wooden shack. A constant stream of curses filled the silent air. Occasionally, glass would shatter.

"Give me the spear." Doevm said as he gazed at the shack.

"Sure," Frey said as he handed the spear over. "But why do you need it? You can't use it."

"The blacksmith, Kilot, is a strong Dwarf. He won't just make us weapons free of charge. We have to exchange him with either good materials and money or we have to beat him in a fight."

"You can just have him make you a weapon if you beat him in a fight?" Frey asked. "That's...weird."

"He is weird." Doevm said. "But he's a damned good blacksmith." He flipped the spear over and showed the symbol of a hammer on the pummel. "He's the one who made this spear. In Dwarven culture, the only blacksmiths that are able to use the hammer as their marks are masters in their craft."

"You sure know a lot." Frey said. "Are you ever going to tell me the truth on how you know all of this one day?"

"..." Doevm was speechless. He stared at Frey, the person he had fought besides for two years. "I guess I underestimated you. I'll eventually tell you...probably."

"Great," Frey sighed. "Just don't take too long or I'll leave you in the dust." He sulked and walked away while Doevm entered the circle inside the forest. His feet immediately noticed the change. Instead of sinking into the dirt a tiny bit, his feet clanged against the heavy amount of metal. As he got closer to the worn-down shack, the cursing got louder.

"Fucking shit," Kilot yelled. "Not again." A glass flew out of the window and broke right beside Doevm. The door flew off the hinges, and a drunken one-armed Dwarf wandered out. "Listen here you filthy human. I can't blacksmith anymore. Just go away." He produced a simple metal hatchet. "Or I'll kill you."

"Kilot, what happened to you?" Doevm asked.

Kilot squinted in the sunlight. He leaned forward: "Do I know you?" As Doevm held up the golden spear, the Dwarf's eyes went wide. "Well I recognize that, but not you. Tell me kid, which noble do you work for."

"My name is Doevm," Doevm said. "I'm sure Arthur told you all about me." At the same time, Doevm let out all of his magic and focused it on the poor Dwarf. "Sober up, I need you to make some things for me."

"Brat," Kilot took a step back, but recomposed himself. The drunken swagger disappeared. Doevm knew what a drunken walk looked like from his years of watching Hank. He knew Kilot was faking it the second he saw him. "Y-You're the Lich."

"That's right. I need you to make some things for me." Doevm walked into the shack as if it was his own. "Come on, we don't have all day." Kilot followed behind, stuck in a state of shock, awe, and anger at how brazenly someone walked into his home.

Inside the shack, there were weapons and empty alcohol bottles everywhere. The many cracked floorboards sunk into the metallic ground. 'I guess he wasn't kidding about not being able to blacksmith,' Doevm thought as he saw the cobwebs around the furnace and anvil on the right side of the room. The couch and bed on the left side were full of food and dead plants from the Blood Forest. He felt a cold breeze enter through the holes in the roof.

"So what happened to you?" Doevm asked. "The last time I saw you, you were a happy Dwarf of age fifty. You made Arthur's armor and some equipment for his companions."

"I decline to answer." Kilot said. "You just walk into my home and ask private questions and expect me to act like a gracious host? What diabolical thing did you do to become a human?" He pointed the hatchet.

Doevm sat down on Kilot's couch and held his hands up: "I didn't mean to become a human, just to reincarnate - just as Arthur did. I'm sure you felt the earthquake, the hero has reincarnated again. There's going to be a war. I need equipment if I'm going to survive it."

"Then go somewhere else." Kilot again pointed to his missing arm. "I. Cannot. Help. You."

"Yes you can." Doevm stood up. "I am a Lich that has been alive for over a thousand and fourteen years. I know a spell or two that can help you, but you have to tell me how you lost your arm. Do you still have it?"

Kilot glared at Doevm: "Wait here, I'll get it." While he retrieved his arm from behind the shack, Doevm thought for a while.

'He should be wary of me, since he isn't sure I'm the same Lich. I gave him enough proof to prove I'm not playing with him. Now I just need him to trust me a little more. It'll be risky, but I have to use this strategy. Hopefully Frey is still far enough away. I cannot lose him at this point, nor can I let him go. I've wasted too many resources on growing him.' He reached into his pocket and felt around the potion. 'And I'm going to waste this on him as well.' He pulled it out. It was empty. Doevm threw the empty bottle on the ground and brought out his life essence. The red mist was less transparent and thicker than before. 'I don't remember drinking it, so when did I...'

"Is everything OK over there?" Kilot asked as he returned. He carried his severed arm, which was covered in dead red vines. It had been sucked dry. Only skin and skeleton remained.

"I'm fine." Doevm huffed and took the arm from Kilot. "I can take a guess but tell me what happened."

"You know I really don't trust you." Kilot growled. "But in the one-in-a-million chance I get to blacksmith again, it's worth it." He sat down on the couch across from Doevm. "I was working on a new project to combine whittling with shaping metal. I got cut. I thought I was safe in here, but I guess a spore landed in my arm. I woke up and half of my arm was covered in vines. I had to chop it off and let the plants take it. I cauterized the rest so that I wouldn't get infected again."

"I understand." Doevm mumbled. "And now the vines are dead, but they're still connected to your arm's nervous system." Black mana circulated around the dead vines. They sprung back to life. He walked over to Kilot: "This is going to hurt."

"What's going to-" Kilot groaned as he placed the severed arm back to its original place. The vines sprouted roots and shot into Kilot's cauterized wound. He screamed and writhed on the couch. Doevm waited for the rainfall of curses to end before Kilot stood up and punched Doevm. "A warning would have been nice, you ass."

"But now you're fine." Doevm got up. "And seeing as you just punched me with your new arm, it works fine. Will you make me equipment?"

"Sure," Kilot said, testing out his new arm by moving it around. "This is both the most amazing and creepiest thing I have ever seen. I thought you were a Lich; how do you know how to heal?"

"I don't." Doevm shrugged. "I just reanimated the vines and told them not to attack you. From now on, you'll live a symbiotic relationship with your arm. It'll live off of your blood, and it'll listen to you. Of course, your arm listens to me because I reanimated it." Doevm activated the arm and it punched Kilot in the face. "Like that. Don't ever tell anyone I reanimated, or I'll strangle you in your sleep."

"I get it." Kilot held the arm back from another punch. "So what do you want me to make?"