Chapter 22: Fate of a Weak World

"And you want to use the Growth aspect of this armor so it can regenerate itself from an assimilation of specifically selected metals and ores... it would work, but the amount you would need is astronomical..."

He finished her thoughts as he inspected the Holy-Grade Armor Rao's Vengence that Samiel was wearing, looking for anything useful. As a Grandmaster Blacksmith, he could see many things about Armor or weapon just by looking at them.

"I can see that this thing your friend is wearing is almost destroyed, and the materials the Armor is forged from are classified as Transcendental, so good luck with your endeavors. But at least Dimiterium should be able to stop the deterioration process for some time; wait here for a while."

Stated Grandmaster Kholic as he put down his hammer and everything and went to the back room to search for something. As a Legendary expert and Grandmaster Blacksmith and Runesmith, he had his personal stash of various precious ores and metals.

He then turned to hold an ingot of weird bluish metal, which both of them identified as Dimeritium. Interestingly, Samiel could sense how magic was disrupted just by taking out the Dimeritium, as it was jamming the magic particles in the air.

"Hey yer try this. When the Ego inside this Armor was destroyed, this thing's state instantly worsened. Probably, the Ego was suppressing the deterioration. Usually, the Egos of powerful artifacts are very strong and could do many wondrous things, or dangerous things."

He passed the Dimeritium Ingot to Samiel, who now felt that his Armor Rao's Vengence came to live, as shadows creeped out from his Armor and enveloped the entire Dimeritium Ingot, essentially assimilating it in a few seconds.

[Holy-Grade Artifact, Rao's Vengence has assimilated 1 whole Dimeritium Ingot.]

[Detoriation process of the Holy-Grade Artifact Rao's Vengence has been stopped.]

Samiel saw the notifications from the Records as his Armor Rao's Vengencce looked less tattered and less like a beaten dog right now. It has recovered a bit; at least visually, it didn't look so bad.

Grandmaster Kholic was observing everything with great interest, as it was not every day you get to observe such precious artifacts. He was even taking some notes on the behavior of the Armor, how it was recovering and how it was changing.

"Thank you very much, Grandmaster."

Said Samiel as he gave the old dwarf a short bow as a sign of gratitude for his help. He knew very well that he could easily refuse them. Even though Yvraine was the Crown Princess of the Nesser Dynasty, it didn't mean she could order around Legendary Level experts as she wished.

"Grandmaster, why did we see so many Lengedaries in the village? Not to mention an entire detachment of soldiers, be it Elven or Dwarven."

Asked Yvraine as they were preparing to leave, as their business was done here and they had quests to complete.

"That new world which got connected to the first floor... it's ya mess that I tell you. Just my fucking luck yer. I came down to the lower floors after more than 200 years, and immediately those fucken greenskins create that mess."

He then returned back to forging his weapon. Grandmaster Kholic was a very old dwarf and someone of very prestigious status, so he wasn't at the lower floors for a very, very long time already.

Even Samiel noticed that there was a heavy military presence from the Nesser Dynasty, and now he remembered that they even saw incoming Darwen Soldiers incoming; all of them were either Silver-Tier or Gold-Tier.

Based on their armors, they were from the Khazad-Tarum, one of their largest and strongest cities. Each Fortress City or Forge City had a unique armor design and crests, so it was very effortless to distinguish their origin from where they came from.

Dwarven Race was divided into countless sub-faction, which were various Forge Cities or Fortress Cities, located deep under the ground, under the mountains and mountain ranges. Only a few rare dwarven cities were built above the ground and not within the mountains or underneath them.

All of the cities had practically nothing together and were existing in some kind of loose alliance, allying with each other only under external threats, such as invasion of Underdark Species, Ratmen, Gnolls, Beastmen or Orks.

Aside from that, these cities, which were ruled by one or more Dwarvish Clans, usually competed against each other or outright held deep hatred against one another.

Not many races were unified entirely and acted as one. Most species didn't depend on this system but rather went through the Strength-Based Social Hierarchy. Cases like Elves which were ruled by strict racial hierarchy were rare ones.

This was the case in species that were heavily dependent on their bloodlines or rather where their bloodlines were the dominant aspect of their society.

The best example would be Blood Races. Social Hierarchy between Blood Races was extremely strict, and one's bloodline was everything. It decided one's fate, either as a ruler or slave.

While they banded together as Dwarven City States Coalition, it was only on a rare occasion as, for example, when an Ork Horde of enormous size was heading at some Forge City or something similar.

Dwarves were interesting species, that despite their stubbornness and sometimes even hatred of one ruling clan against another, they were still able to fight side by side against the common enemy of the dwarven race if the situation called for it.

"What has happened, Grandmaster?"

Asked Samiel, as because he and Yvraine were spending all of their time in the Darkwood Forest, far from the civilization, they didn't get a lot of knew what was happening around the Tower.

"The Midnight World, which was connected to the Tower, finally got invaded by the Bloodtooth Tribe in enormous Waagh, but soon after, other factions descended down. Apparently, the Midnight World is a mana-less world with some pretty advanced technology. Hence, they managed to hold down Orks for one week, but after that, their defenses were broken, and now Orks are wreaking havoc there. As if those dumb green skulls are capable of anything else."

Mana-less worlds were worlds where mana wasn't present or was diminished for whatever reason. These words then developed in pure scientific ways, and mysteries were a dead end for them.

Though it didn't mean that scientific civilizations were weak, they could develop to frightening heights. Those who were on the stage of a space-faring civilization and had available energy-based weaponry could threaten even Legendaries, but those were rare.

Unfortunately for them, other more powerful factions or Transcendentals usually destroyed them along the way. That was, even if the civilization developed to very high heights, unfortunately for them, they rarely accumulated enough foundation to repel hundreds of Legendaries sieging them at the same time.

Earth was also on the verge of becoming a pure Mana-Less world, as it wasn't long from that state. It was something that Samiel noticed, that mana density on the Earth was constantly lowering with each passing year.

"The population is more than 10 billion in that world, so many other factions are going nuts from the possibility of harvesting the souls of such a large world; some Daemon Cults, Calamity Church, and Devil Cults are already there fighting against each other. Yesterday, even those psychopaths from the Hall of Kadath arrived, and the person here was that bastard Zaldidraax."

Cursed he, as all dwarves had one great common enemy.

Dragons.

It didn't matter if it were Chromatic Dragon Flocks or Metallic Dragon Flocks; all dragons were enemies of dwarves, together with their cults and spawns. There was a lot of bad blood between Dragons and Dwarves, just like those clischés in the fantasy novels Samiel read.

Hearing that many Daemon Cultists and Devil Cultists were lurking here together with the people from the Calamity Church could scare someone shitless. Deamon Cults and Devil Cults were devoted to some particular Daemon or Devil whom they worshipped.

Meanwhile, Calamity Church worshipped Evil Gods, which were the worst kind of Gods ever could be, and some said even Outer Gods were more benevolent than the Evil Gods.

"I heard when that mad lizard descended onto the world, he almost sunk an entire continent, and he even killed one of the High Priests of the Calamity Church and ate a few Legendary Demons that were summoned from the Abyss by mad cultists..."

He cursed while he hammered the sword.

"I will advise you two to finish your Quests as soon as possible to leave because this mess would only spread through the entire 1st Floor sooner or later. Now scram, I need to finish this sword."

Advised them Grandmaster Kholic before kicking them out. This was going to shake the entire Tower, and probably even part of the Cosmos, as all High Priests of the Calamity Church were peerless Legendary experts that terrorized the Tower and countless worlds for an untold number of years.

"This is worse than you thought..."

Remarked Samiel with a tired voice as he looked at Yvraine.

"It appears that I have miscalculated... I didn't know it would be far fetched... the population of that world is too appealing to countless people in the Tower, as even Transcendents could benefit greatly from obtaining that many souls even if they are from mortals... not to mention Legendaries who have been stuck at their Level, could use countless forbidden rituals to advance their Level."

Sighed Yvraine, as Samiel was too distressed about the situation.

Not about the fate of the world and its inhabitants, that was not his problem, as similar scenes happened all around the Cosmos, all the time. It was just a natural circle of all things, so nothing that should trouble him.

When the world is weak or without a strong protector, then the only fate it awaits is despair and destruction in the hands of more powerful factions.

Though, these humans were a bit unlucky.

As a pure scientific civilization, Gods didn't want to spread their faith there, meaning only one who came to their world would be those who wanted to play harvesters or carry out some bloody mass-slaughtering rituals and sacrifice the mortals for power.

Gods would at least give them a way out if they chose to worship them, even if it meant being enslaved for all eternity.