Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

“Kek kek kek, who would have thought that Olympus would steel us the show like this?” a jolly voice chortled.

“That aura?! It’s you! What are you doing here?” Seth suddenly jumped from his seat and looked at the hooded figure in the second row to the right.

“haha! It has been me all along!” the figure flung away its robe and revealed that it had been a dwarf standing on the seat all along. A potbellied midget, with jiggling man boobs and an ugly lion head cackled happily as he exposed the whole dimension to his full frontal nudity.

“Bes!” the god of chaos exclaimed. It was the first time the always laid-back Seth seemed genuinely upset.

“My, my… I know we had our differences, but you should really get over it. Especially when we might meet each other more often in the future. I just chose a really cute little champion,” Bes said with a wide, happy grin.

“If it isn’t Bes “the defender of everything good and the enemy of all that is bad”. Please wear something appropriate,” Hades scolded the dwarf unfazed.

“You are still a partypooper…”

Although he complained, the protector homes followed the request of the god of the underworld and wore a shendyt, covering the unspeakable once again.

“Happy?”

“Moderately. Calm down, Seth. It’s not you had that big of a feud.”

Although the god of destruction seemed unreconciled, he shrugged and sat down without saying a word. Bes only grinned and sat back down among the other deities from Heliopolis that had come to watch at Seth’s invitation.

Not everyone was paying attention to the bickering of the Egyptian gods. As Bes had mentioned, Olympus had stolen their show. Hephaestus had only eyes for a single figure in the room roughly opposite his seat.

The face could change, the stature could change, but he would recognize her clear, gray eyes anywhere. Eyes emitting intelligence, excellent and a hint of superiority, without seeming haughty or cold. Their eyes met.

“Athena…” he whispered with bitter-sweet pain in his voice. She looked away, but there was just the slightest hint of a blush on her cheeks. She wasn’t the only Olympian that had stepped in, on this fight.

“Athena, Phobos, why are you guys hiding in the crowd? We are family, you should sit with us,” Apollo took the word. Two seats appeared, one between himself and Hephaestus and one beside Hermes. His gesture made it clear that he intended for Athena to sit beside Hephaestus.

The goddess of wisdom’s cool facade showed just a hint of being troubled for a duration of time only a god could pick up on. She sighed and came over, sitting down between Apollo and Hephaestus.

“Hello, Hephi-aestus. Apollo and Hermes,” she greeted them with a nod.

A moment later. Hermes suddenly appeared behind someone and pulled down their hood. It revealed an Olympian helmet that hid the face of the figure in the darkness. He was slightly shaking and didn’t seem to notice that his hood came off.

“You know, Brother Apollo spoke to you. You should stop laughing to yourself all creepily and sit with us Phobos.”

“U-uncle Hermes! I’m sorry, Uncle Apollo,” he apologized surprisingly flustered.

“No need, you just picked up a very compatible champion. I can understand that you are happy,” Apollo said with an amicable smile.

“Stop standing around and sit down already,” Hades said with a scowl.

“Y-yes, Great-Uncle.”

…

Just after the battle, Seth got two notifications but he ignored them and rushed over to Mike. The almost three-meter-tall anthropomorphic lion was breathing heavily.

“Mike, are you okay?” he asked his soon-to-be brother-in-law.

The lion couldn’t answer as a wolf, almost as tall as himself, jumped at him and hugged his neck in tears repeating his name over and over. Seth backed off. Mike seemed to be okay and the two hairy lovers deserved some time to deal with their feeling among themselves.

The blacksmith did the only sensible thing and went over to soothe Mina, who had just witnessed her brother almost die. The cat had held herself together until the fight was over, now that the target for her anger has fled, she completely unraveled in his arms.

“T-this is your fault,” she finally sobbed after a while. “If you-“

Seth hugged her tightly, interrupting her.

“Yes, I’m sorry. It’s my fault. I was wrong. I didn’t expect things to turn out this way and I should have stepped in earlier.”

“Y-You should have-!” “I should have.”

She just needed a place to unload her sorrows and Seth willingly took it, hugging her tightly while she drenched his chest in tears…and a little bit of snot. He also decided to apologize to the others, later. He thought it was necessary, but he had overestimated the danger of the hive and their speed of action. In his attempt to strengthen everyone, he had led them into unforeseen danger.

“Fin, I’m also sorry to have put you into this situation,” he said when Mina had calmed a little.

“Ngh- I-It’s fine. Fin is fine,” the fairy insisted with an awkward smile.

However, Seth saw right through her facade. Fin had spent over a year with “Yulecat’s Fur”. Seeing Mike hurt like that had hit her almost as hard as Mina.

“No need to hold back, Fin. Come here.” “He’s right, just let it out,” Mina added with an encouraging smile.

Hearing this, Fin’s dams broke and she rushed into Mina’s and Seth’s embrace, crying really unsightly.

“It’s my fault! Fin- I couldn’t help Mike even when I saw it happen!” she wept. “I wasn’t strong enough, Fin couldn’t help anyone again!”

“It’s okay, nobody blames you.” “Yes, it’s not your fault, Fin.” “Look, Mike is completely fine now, already back to flirting with Lydia.”

Fin noisily sniffed back her snot. “W-What do you mean?… That giant doggy is Lydia?”

“Well, you weren’t the only ones that had stuff happen.”

Slowly the members of Minas Mar assembled around Seth, Mina, and Fin that held each other in their arms. With Mike and Lydia, beside Duhu, Minas Mar kept growing hairier. It was a relief when the two soon shrank back down to their human appearances.

When everyone calmed down, the teams returned to camp, to sort out what had happened today, while the fair took over to process the corpses that piled up on the plateau. Some had become chosen ones, others had gained strong blessings. The difference when it came to one’s status was in the class.

A blessing granted additional skills and attributes, becoming a chosen one would do the same and more. It would change one of the two classes a player could have and grant them part of the divine power of the god.

Among the member of Minas Mar Lydia, Faenys, Jonah, Fin, and surprisingly Archer had become chosen ones. Mina, Mike, and Monique had only gained blessings. Now, this didn’t mean that blessings were worth less, as one could gain multiple blessings and a blessing could be a god’s way to call dibs on a player.

Of these eight, Lydia and Mike had gained the powers with the most obvious changes.

“Well, I gained the Blessing of a god called Maahes. I still don’t quite have the hang of it, but it allowed me to take on Lord Maahes’ likeness which raises my physical prowess and combat abilities. At the same time, it says I gain some control over fire, wind, and water…”

“It’s similar for me. I became the chosen of Wepwawet. It changed by second class into Trailblazer, which slightly improves my ability to see, detect, set, and diffuse traps, and I gained Wepwawet’s mastery of club and bow. In addition, I can also take on his likeness to improve my overall combat power. It says I would greatly boost the skills of my second class if I take on the god’s shape. On that note, I may need new weapons to make use of these skills,” she said with a cheeky smile, looking at the blacksmith expectantly.

Seth just ignored her stare, he wasn’t the giving tree, but for some reason, Lydia’s grin only became cheekier.

“You see, actually, I didn’t just gain skills. Lord Wepwawet also gave me these and said to find a blacksmith that could make divine weapons from it,” she said triumphantly and pulled out a bar of copper-colored metal, a bundle of white string, and a piece of timber from her inventory.

“You know, I could also-” she wanted to tease him, but Seth had already snatched the bar from her hands.

“Now we are talking. We can speak about the kind of weapon later,” he said while naturally stashing away the bar of special material in his own inventory. It followed an awkward silence that was broken by Fin.

“Fin became the Chosen of a funny dwarf called Bes. He has a really big potbelly and bigger boobies than Fin.” A different kind of awkward silence followed Fin’s statement.