TS5: Chapter 33 (Patreon)

The rundown forge building was tucked back from the main street, a maze of alleyways separating it from Old Iron Village’s main thoroughfare. As he walked along the empty streets, Thorn couldn’t help but imagine what they would look like the following day when the townsfolk had appeared. The god beasts should have arrived by now, but the town’s gates had already been closed, meaning that they would have to find their own places to stay outside of the town until the following day.

According to what Metra had said, staying outside of the village would invariably force conflict with the local wildlife, meaning that the god beasts were in for a fight before they would be able to enter the town the next day. While that seemed like a disadvantage on the surface, Thorn honestly wasn’t sure. Being forced to fight the local fauna was certainly a challenge, but the bodies of the beasts could be sold to Felmer of Felmer’s General Goods, providing denari that could be spent in the village.

Pausing as he arrived outside of the forge, Thorn listened to the faint crackle of the coals while he organized his thoughts. Reaching for the door handle, he found himself oddly hesitant. It had been ages since he had been scared of anything, but the simple doorway seemed to have awoken considerable nervousness in his heart. Holding his breath, Thorn opened the door and stepped inside, ducking his head to get through the eight foot tall doorway.

When he straightened, he found himself in a large, single room forge. In the center of the room stood a bell-shaped furnace whose coals glowed cherry red. A heavy bellows hung in the air next to the bellows and an easy step away was a huge anvil. Across the room were two tables and a shelf, piled high with an assortment of weapons and armor that had been tossed there in no discernible order, while across the room, all of the blacksmith’s tools hung on the wall. Piles of raw material were organized under tarps at the back of the room or placed in barrels that filled the corners.

Near the forge, on the other side from the anvil, was a simple bench, its rough hewn construction reminding Thorn of something that might be found in a log cabin. It was especially hefty, made from a six inch thick plank, which explained why it held the massive figure that was sitting on it, watching Thorn. Though he had not yet risen, Thorn estimated that the bearded blacksmith in front of him was at least ten feet tall from the way his hunched shoulders filled the space. Taking a step further into the forge, Thorn didn’t need an introduction to know who it was he was facing.

“Hello, my name is Thorn.”

A faint smile, hidden by his beard, crossed the man’s face as he stood up, towering over Thorn.

“Well met, Thorn. My name is Urmag’Tal. But I suppose you already guessed that.”

“It's an honor to meet you.”

“Oh? That’s nice of you to say,” Urmag’Tal said, gesturing for Thorn to come forward. “I don’t have many seats that will hold you but you can sit on the anvil if you’d like.”

Meeting Urmag’Tal’s gaze, Thorn found himself having trouble tearing his attention away from the Titan’s brilliant brown eyes. They were like two endlessly deep pools that threatened to swallow Thorn up. Trying to recenter his heart, Thorn made his way to the anvil as Urmag’Tal sat back down on his bench. For a moment the two Titans just stared at each other, each occupied by their own thoughts, the crackle of the coals the only sound in the forge. After the silence had stretched to nearly a full minute, Urmag’Tal reached out and grabbed a metal rod that leaned on the bench and used it to poke at the coals, causing the room to brighten.

“I’ve been expecting you for some time,” Urmag’Tal said, not looking at Thorn as he stirred the fire, “and while I wasn’t starting to get worried exactly, I must admit to feeling a bit of relief that you’ve arrived.”

“Am I late?”

“No, not exactly late, but if you hadn’t arrived in this cycle, I would have probably gone looking for you.”

Surprised by Urmag’Tal’s words, Thorn’s mental sense swept over the Titan once more, examining him closely. With a deep, throaty chuckle, Urmag’Tal waved his hand as he put the fire poker down.

“I’m no more than a faint sliver of will, Thorn, but you will eventually come to realize that for us, a sliver of will is just as great as the whole. But since you are here, I'm saving a tremendous amount of work, which I really appreciate.”

“Can I ask why you’re waiting here for me?”

“That’s a surprisingly easy question to answer,” Urmag’Tal said, lacing his fingers together as he leaned forward, his eyes boring into Thorn. “My divinity is based around teaching, and the Valley of Elements is my classroom.”

“You are saying that you are here to teach me?” Thorn asked, scratching his cheek.

“No,” Urmag’Tal replied, shaking his head. “Well, not you specifically. I just said that my divinity is based around teaching, and the Valley of Elements is my classroom. This place exists to instruct those who enter, both in the use of the elements, and in a variety of other lessons. This sliver of my will was left behind as a way to continue to teach the avatars and their god beasts how to access their powers properly so they might continue to protect the endless worlds.”

Eyes widening, Thorn’s mind churned as he processed the unspoken words Urmag’Tal’s statement contained. Across from him, Urmag’Tal held up his hand, extending three fingers into the air.

“While you and I have much to discuss over the next year, there is no real rush. Much of what you have to learn will need to be learned through practice. But at the same time, I’m sure you have many burning questions, so I’ll agree to answer three of them.”

Sitting in the warmth of the forge, Thorn took a deep breath and sifted through the thousands of questions rolling around in his mind, trying to find the ones that were most pressing. After a moment, he nodded and straightened, gazing straight at Urmag’Tal.

“Can you explain the structure of the Endless Worlds to me?”

Raising his eyebrows, Urmag’Tal looked amused, but instead of rejecting the question as too broad, he nodded and reached into the forge. With his bare hand he scooped up a handful of burning coals, flinging them up into the air where they hung like tiny comets. Blowing lightly, Urmag’Tal caused the floating coals to spin, transforming the inside of the forge into an endless, surging sea of stars. Lifting his hand, he clenched his fist and between him and Thorn, one hundred stars gathered together, lining up into a spiraling column that formed the core of the sea.

“This is the structure of the Endless Worlds,” Urmag’Tal said once he had finished creating it. “An endless expanse of worlds that extend forever in all directions, supported by the one hundred core worlds that make up Intra Mundum. In ages past, before the tower was created, the void only held one hundred worlds. These worlds were disconnected and isolated, making them easy pickings for the evil forces that seek to subjugate them to their own nefarious desires. One of our predecessors, presumably tired of running all around to defend the various worlds and the difficulty of crossing the void, organized them into the tower, binding them together through magic that until that time, had not existed.

“The effect of binding these worlds together was one that not even he had anticipated. From the tower, new worlds began to appear, forming at seemingly random in the void and falling into orbit around the tower. From these worlds, beings began to make their way to the tower, climbing through the one hundred worlds as they grew in strength. Those who reached the pinnacle formed families and organizations, creating the current power structure of the Endless Worlds, and passing some of their strength down to their descendants to make their climb easier.

“New worlds are being created all the time, extending out into the void in an ever growing spiral, their inhabitants growing in power until they can make their way to the tower. At the same time, the worlds that make up the core of the tower, are endlessly expanding to accommodate them. It’s a pretty ingenious system, and though I would have done it a bit differently, I can’t help but admire the craftsmanship of the entire thing. The Titan who made it certainly deserves his title. Does that answer your question?”

Nodding, Thorn lifted two fingers.

“It does, thank you. My second question. What are the evils you mentioned that threaten the Endless Worlds?”

A curious expression flashed across Urmag’Tal’s face and he stared at Thorn for a moment, as if he was trying to figure out the answer to a question of his own. Just before Thorn asked him what he was thinking about, Urmag’Tal nodded and answered Thorn’s question.

“There are countless evils, but only four that threaten the Endless Worlds. The main evils are the Devils, the Dragons, and the blight known as the Unmaking. Each pursues their goals differently, but all of them seek only one thing. The complete subjugation of the Endless Worlds.”

Waving his hand, Urmag’Tal shrank down the sea of stars until it hung between the two Titans, slowly rotating around the core of the tower. At the edges of the swirling stars was a faint fog, and even as Thorn watched he thought that he could see tiny worlds coming into existence in tiny flashes of light. Urmag’Tal pointed to a spot below the sea of stars and with a flash a single crimson world appeared, rippling as if it was responding to the moving worlds that rotated above it.

“This is the Abyss. A single world that is so large it might as well be endless, as it contains a conceptual reflection of every other world that has sentient life.”

“That’s where the Devils live,” Thorn said, his eyes narrowing.

“It is. Judging from the way you said that, I assume you’ve had a bit of experience,” Urmag’Tal said, with an amused smile. “While they’re not particularly strong in the grand scheme of things, Devils are annoyingly persistent creatures, and their only purpose is to corrupt those who live in the Endless Worlds. They do this by tempting individuals with promises of power, using the connections they form to create gates and launch invasions. Once they’ve conquered a world, it is absorbed into the Abyss, becoming part of their world. Their eventual goal is to absorb the one hundred core worlds, bringing the Endless Worlds under their control.

“Next up, we have the Dragons. Nasty, deceitful, and cowardly, they fear the strong and tyrannize the weak. Ever since the first Dragon Emperor tried to conquer the core worlds and was killed by the first Titan, they have been repeating the same age old dance. With the death of each Dragon Emperor, they go into hiding, waiting until the Titan steps through the doorway before they emerge from the shadows to try and dominate everything once again. Like the Devils, Dragons like to work through others, manipulating them into carrying out their commands. Unlike the Devils, there are a limited number of Dragons, as each one is a thread of the first dragon’s soul that was split up in a vain attempt to survive after the first dragon died. Though dragons are immune to the negative effects of aging, they can be slain like any other beast, though doing so will mark you with a curse that will have every other dragon you meet trying to kill you. I would imagine they’re starting to move.”

“Then there is the Unmaking. The void’s attempt to return everything to its null state. You might call them void elementals, as they operate the same way that elementals do, just with the chaos of the void powering them as opposed to a singular element. Where exactly they come from isn’t known, just that they begin to appear and infect worlds around the time that the new Titan rises. If Titans are beings that build up and improve the Endless Worlds, the Unmaking takes apart the Titan’s work, reducing it to nothingness. Incidentally, they do the same to both the Devils and the Dragons, so the one saving grace is that they don’t join hands with either of the other forces.”

“What about the fourth threat?” Thorn asked, causing Urmag’Tal to chuckle and lift a meaty finger to point at Thorn’s chest.

“You.”

“Hold on, what do you mean by that?” Thorn asked, leaning back. “You mean that I’m a threat to the Endless Worlds?”

“That is exactly what I mean,” Urmag’Tal said, stroking his beard with his hand. “If you decided that rather than defend the Endless Worlds you wanted to subjugate the core worlds, who would be able to stop you? If you turned your forging ability to creating weapons of war, who could stand against you?”

“I thought that Titans were protectors of the Endless Worlds?”

“Hah, if only things were that simple. You speak of our race as if we are some sort of mechanical being unable to deviate from our prescribed path. No, we are as varied and individual as any other race, Thorn. If you chose to dominate the Endless Worlds through force, you would not be the first, and likely not the last either. Take your father, Kagma’Tal as an example.”

Hearing his dad’s name, Thorn felt his breath catch in his chest, and Urmag’Tal, noticing it, grinned.

“People are complicated, Thorn, and Titans are no exception. Your father had an ambition and he carried it out, though for better or worse, it’s hard to say. He forged an empire that completely dominated the Endless Worlds, forcing everyone to submit through the power of the technology he created. He forced the Devils into contracts that bound them to their world, terrified the dragons into abandoning their empire, and created a method that turned the Unmaking into a power source. He brought incredible prosperity to the Endless Worlds, but every empire has a dark side, and for every advancement, there were entire worlds that were ground up as grist for his mill.

“None of us asked for the power we possess, but we still have to decide what to do with it. Furthermore, that burden increases as the generations pass. You not only have to deal with your own desires, but with the effects of every single one of your predecessors’ actions. While your father was reacting to the impact of his father’s choice to create the god beasts, you have to deal with his choice to retreat from the Endless Worlds after the creation of that thing you have beating in your chest, allowing the empire to fall to pieces.”