Paragon of Destruction

With little else to do in the week they waited for the defeated Lord's blacksmiths to arrive, Arran and Kaleesh spent much of their time training together, each instructing the other on their own insights.

Arran soon found that studying the captain's insight was exactly as difficult as he expected it to be.

The captain was a skilled teacher — even more so than Arran had expected — but studying an insight was no easy matter. It required gaining an understanding of a sliver of reality, and that was something that couldn't be achieved through mere practice.

Kaleesh had taught Arran several series of movements that clearly contained a hint of insight, but although learning the movements was simple enough, the true challenge was to truly understand the knowledge that was hidden within them.

And that, Arran knew, was a task that would take more than a single week.

Yet while Arran's task was a difficult one, Kaleesh faced an even greater challenge.

Arran had some experience in teaching, but nowhere near as much as the captain. And in teaching insights, his experience was all but non-existent.

After racking his brain on how to best instruct Kaleesh, he eventually decided to teach the man a simplified version of the sword style he'd created for himself. Since the style was built around his true insight into severing, studying it should provide the captain with a way to explore the insight.

That wouldn't be an easy path, but it was a path nonetheless, and Kaleesh accepted it eagerly.

Absorbed in training as they were, a week passed quickly. Then, finally, Kadun's blacksmiths arrived — over a dozen of them, men and women both, with a small army of servants, assistants, and apprentices following behind them.

It was immediately obvious that the master craftsmen were not at all pleased with the prospect of working for an outsider. They made little effort to hide their disdain for the captain, and the other mercenaries, they ignored entirely.

Yet their reluctance lasted barely an hour. When the captain took them into the mines and showed them his stockpile of starmetal, the sight of it left them in a state of utter shock.

One of them — a middle-aged man, broad with muscle — actually fainted when he saw the chamber filled with the precious metal.

Their shock only grew further when the captain presented them with his list of requirements, however, and when he stated that the work had to be finished in two months, they quickly dismissed the task as impossible.

"You have to understand," the burly man explained, his tone only slightly condescending, "that shaping starmetal is exceedingly difficult. Even with all of us working day and night, what you require would take at least half a year, and likely even longer than that."

The captain nodded in understanding. "I see," he said. "Then I will have to find other craftsmen to do part of the work." He sighed wistfully, and continued, "Of course, that means your reward will be split with them, as well."

The burly man narrowed his eyes. "What sort of reward would that be?"

The captain gestured at the chamber full of starmetal ore. "A third of this is mine. Most of that will be needed to equip my men, but the remainder will still be more than we can carry into the desolation. Since I have little other use for it, I thought it would make a suitable gift for the craftsmen who forged our weapons and armor."

At this, a ripple of excitement ran through the group of blacksmiths, their expressions suddenly filled with undisguised greed.

"We can do it," the burly man said hurriedly. "What you need… we can do it. There's no need to involve others."

"Are you certain you can give me what I require?" Kaleesh asked, a hint of a smile on his lips. "Because if I receive anything less than perfection, there will be no reward at all."

"I'm certain," the blacksmith replied, his eyes fixed on the treasure before him. "Each piece you receive will be fit for a Lord."

"I expect no less than that," the captain replied. "And I expect you to finish the work no more than two months from now."

The blacksmith hesitated for a moment, then said, "Three months."

Kaleesh raised an eyebrow as he glanced at the man. "I thought you said you could do what I asked?"

"With two months, we can forge you weapons fit for a Lord," the blacksmith replied. "But with three, we can do better than that." He shot the captain a grin, and added, "No Lord has ever paid us this well."

Kaleesh answered the man's grin with one of his own. "Three months it is, then."

Eager at the prospect of earning untold riches, the crafters wasted no time in setting their many servants to work on bringing the vast hoard of starmetal to the surface, where they carefully loaded it onto the wagons they'd brought with them.

The real work would be done in the city, where the blacksmiths' forges stood. To work starmetal, Arran knew that these would be no common forges, and he felt some curiosity about the tools the blacksmiths used to accomplish such a task.

When he asked one of the blacksmiths about it, however, she gave him a disgusted glare, her expression no less offended than it would have been had he asked her to undress — and perhaps even more so.

Whatever their secret was, it was clear that they kept it well. And although Arran's curiosity remained, he decided against pursuing the matter. He had enough to worry about without trying to unearth the smiths' secrets.

Even with the help of the mercenaries, it took the blacksmiths and their servants a full day to bring all the starmetal to the surface. And when they finally readied themselves to leave, Arran saw that Rahm had joined them.

The Knight hadn't left with Muna and the others, and Arran had briefly wondered about the reason for this. But now, he understood that Rannoc had left the Knight not to guard the mines or the mercenaries, but to protect the captain's treasure. And now that the treasure was moving, it appeared the Knight would move with it.

"Do you trust them?" he asked Kaleesh as they watched the blacksmiths leave.

"I trust Rannoc," Kaleesh replied. "As much as he values the starmetal, he values us even more. He wouldn't risk a prize like that for a bit of ore, nor would he allow others to do so."

"He values us?" Arran frowned. "But we're planning to leave."

"And if we return," Kaleesh said, "we'll be even more valuable. Rannoc isn't a fool like Kadun. He knows how much he stands to gain from supporting us."

"What exactly is it that he stands to gain?" Arran asked, giving the captain a curious look.

"Potential Knights," Kaleesh said. "If we succeed, he assumes we'll need a patron. And unless we join the clergy or enter the Imperator's service, Rannoc would be the obvious choice."

Arran gave the captain a puzzled look. "The Imperator? What's that?

"Who's that," Kaleesh corrected Arran. "The Imperator is what the Darians call their emperor."

"They have an emperor?" Arran looked at the captain in surprise. "So the Imperium has a ruler?"

"Not a ruler, exactly," Kaleesh replied. "The Imperator keeps the balance between the Lords and the Archons. He can't match either side, but should a conflict emerge between them, he's powerful enough to tip the scales."

Arran creased his brow in thought. "And he has his own Knights?"

"Many," Kaleesh said. "And he commands the most powerful troops in the Imperium. But he cannot match the sheer numbers of either the church or the Lords, and so, they are outside his control — for the most part, at least."

"Are you planning on joining him?" Arran asked.

It was an obvious possibility. If the Imperator's Knights were stronger than others, then they likely possessed more potent secrets. And from what Arran had seen of the Imperium, he did not think the factions shared their knowledge easily.

"That's not as simple as you might think," Kaleesh responded with a slight chuckle. "To enter the Imperator's service requires both talent and skill, but also connections. And although we have the former two, we are still sorely lacking in the latter."

Arran glanced at the captain, then asked, "And if we manage to fix that?"

"Entering the Imperator's service would open many doors," Kaleesh said. "To knowledge, to power…" There was a glint of longing in his eyes as he spoke, yet a moment later, he shook his head. "But that's a distant dream. We have three months before we depart. I suggest you use them well."

Of course, that was exactly what Arran intended to do.

He had no shortage of things to learn — Kaleesh's insight into speed, the foundation Muna had shown him, and how to best handle the giant sword. And then, of course, there were the Forms, which had yet to yield anything useful.

Still, he did not feel overwhelmed by the many tasks before him. After the priest's blessing — the supposed god's bloodline — he had little need for sleep. And with three months to spend on nothing but training, that should allow him to make at least some progress.

He thought for a moment, then set off to retrieve his oversized sword.

While the heavy weapon was hardly suitable for the series of rapid movements Kaleesh had taught him, he thought that might be a good thing.

If nothing else, the additional challenge would force him to learn the movements perfectly. Perhaps the added effort would help him progress faster.

Either way, he would need to study as best he could. Because when the three months ended, they would depart for the Desolation.

And there, Arran wanted all the strength he could get.