"Do you plan to craft a set of armor?" Bastil asked, reading the list Lee gave.
This actually looked like sothing an artificer had compiled. Alongside the iron ore and fire sparks Lee wrote down, it listed ingredients like sulfur, coal, flux and oil. More importantly, it included large amounts of water – a nuance Lee completely overlooked.
"No, a sword." Lee said.
"Should I cut off your finger right away?" Bastil said, angrily looking his way.
From the looks of it, the man was displeased with the amount of resources Daniel requested, or maybe faked anger.
"Lord Bastil, I implore you to give a chance!" Lee begged, "I only know how to craft according to my Master’s ... ehm ... I an, according to my previous master’s teachings. I’m not even an elental lord, you know ... and, to be honest ... I’m really scared ..."
"Good!" Bastil said with a snort, "You’ll get your chance! But if you fail, it’ll be your last failure!"
"Sir ..." Lee helplessly looked at the man’s back as he departed, and slamd the door behind him.
’Phew ... so far so good!’ Lee thought to himself, ’I really hope he doesn’t sit around here, staring at my fingers!’
***
Bastil returned only three days later, along with several servants who brought in the items on Lee’s list. And to Lee’s annoyance actually stayed behind to take a look at his work.
Lee thanked heavens he worked for two months as a blacksmith’s apprentice in outer part of the Celestial Abyss sect. It wasn’t a lot of practice, but at least he could imitate organizing the workplace and the initial actions convincingly enough.
When he finally began to hamr, Bastil cursed under his nose and left. Even if he wasn’t bored from watching Lee, the sound of hamring in the small room kept piercing his ears, and in the end forced to leave.
But Lee was already concerned with the next problem. He needed to forge an actual replica of Flaresteel – the sword he was fake-crafting. Surely the ti will co when soone will want to take a look at his progress. At that mont he couldn’t have a ready product yet, but couldn’t present a piece of scrap either.
He thought of a simple passable solution.
When seven days later Bastil returned, Lee was kneeling on the floor with his back to the door. The sword was placed in front of him and it looked like he was either inscribing so runic symbols on it or planning to do that.
"How’s the progress?" Bastil asked, but at that mont there was a muffled blast with a bit of smoke, and Lee looked at him, lost, with bloodied face.
"I ..." He was trying to say sothing, but it was obvious that Bastil had interrupted an important process and Lee had made a mistake.
"Hmph! Wash yourself and start over!" Basil snorted, and left.
"You know that won’t work the second ti?" Lee heard Daniel’s voice.
"Ye, I’ll have to think of sothing." Lee said.
"But sooner or later you’ll have to have a finished product." Daniel said, "You can’t go without results in this place. They’ll find out you’re a clueless kid."
"We’ll see about that." Lee said.
He wasn’t worried. He had at least a period of twelve months he could play an artificer. Then it’ll beco a problem.
One couldn’t plan a prison break in a day. First he had to figure out why no one had escaped this place, or if they had, how did they do it. He also lacked the information on the guard patrols and whether the roof was guarded. In short, he had to learn a lot things. Artifact crafting wasn’t one of them.
***
A month and a half later Lee shocked the whole castle, or rather – the resident elental lords, including Daniel.
He presented Bastil a beautiful sword, without a scabbard, though. It was two and a half feet long, with beautifully engraved runes, and at the first glance Bastil knew it was a treasure.
He had lost any hope the kid would actually succeed. Seeing Lee fail over and over again, almost always covered in blood, he ca to a conclusion that it was a mistake to keep him alive. Fortunately, before he decided to kill the young artificer, the guy produced a miraculous result.
"This looks passable." Bastil said when Lee formally finished the sword, "But you wasted too many materials!"
"I’m sorry, your Lordship!" Lee said, "May I rest for a while? I’m really spent ..."
"Fine! But that’ll be your reward! Hmph!" Bastil said, and stord out, probably to deliver the sword to the castle lord.
Lee grinned at the closed door, but heard Daniel’s voice.
"Boy, how did you pull that off?"
"It’s a miracle." Lee said.
"Don’t give that shit!" Dante sounded upset.
"I’ll tell you when we get out of here." Lee said.
"Impossible." Dante said.
"There’s no such thing in the world." Lee argued.
"You can’t break through the Nullite bars, nor you can damage them. You can’t break through the door, and even if you could, the elental lords would stomp you dead." Dante patiently explained everything Lee already knew.
"What about the guards? Can we bribe anyone to let us sneak out?" Lee asked. During his ti here one of the guards hinted at the possibility of Lee crafting sothing for him for a favor.
"They’ll scam you. Felix lost both legs like that." Dante said, "The best you can do is get out a ssage to your loved ones. No guard will agree to anything more dangerous than that. In fact, this is where the surplus materials are used for."
Lee already knew that Felix was the other Dante’s neighbor. Apart from him, there were five actual artificers locked up here, all elental lords, and all crippled, evidently on purpose.
"Then it’s more complicated." Lee said.
"Then it’s impossible." Dante said, but then continued in whisper, "As long as Lucien Duvant is alive, noting will change."
"Heh, why didn’t you open with that?" Lee said with a shallow laugh, and continued, "Then all I have to do is to kill him!"
"Idiot!" Dante cursed.
"Do you have a better idea?" Lee asked.
"First of all – you’ll need an army! He has five elental masters protecting him!" Dante said.
"Didn’t you say I need to kill only him?" Lee asked, "Why? What will happen if he dies? Will his followers start infighting? Will there be an uprising within the army?"
"No. It’s complicated." Dante said.
"I’m a pretty smart guy." Lee said.
"How can I know you’re not here to get this information from ?" Dante asked.
"I am." Lee said, "Although I have no clue what you an, I need every bit of information before I die here."
He obviously knew what Dante ant, and Dante knew Lee wasn’t an idiot. But he had his reasons for holding back.
"Listen, I know we’re not buddies or anything." Lee said, "I have no way to persuade you with words. Give a hint how can I persuade you with actions and maybe we can finally think of a way out of here."
"Kid, I like you, but the life doesn’t work that way." Dante said with a sigh, "You can’t swim against the current ..."
"Wanna bet?" Lee asked, inwardly laughing at himself. All of his lives he had been doing solely that!
"Lucient Duvant ... is immortal." Dante said, "Not literally, of course. But he has so many artifacts on him, you can’t kill him with a weapon. Being the cultivator of the earth elent, he has incredible defenses, impenetrable. I know there are other worlds out there with many incredible cultivators, but we only have a handful of elental lords, and most are on his side."
"Most?" Lee imdiately picked up the nuance.
"Most." Dante said, "There is the leader of the resistance, but he can’t attack Duvant because ... of reasons, but other’s wouldn’t dare to do anything as long as the man is alive. Duvant’s henchn aren’t that strong. They’re elental lords with only a single comprehended law at most, if any. All that we need ... is for Duvant to die."
"Alright!" Lee said, "Tell all you know about him!"
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