The next two days were hectic and passed in a blur.

Jorge had me and Nathlan embark on a brutal training program. We worked out, sparred, learnt everything he could teach, and even ventured into the city again – under his strict oversight – to try our hands at blending in with crowds, discerning good prices, haggling, urban navigation and everything else one would learn to do if they were brought up in a bustling city. A million tiny skills one needed to thrive in the heart of civilisation. It was like the survival skills we practiced in the wild, except over two days instead of two months.

By the end of it, I suspected it was simply something to keep us busy, but that was fine by me. My paranoia was only just abating after the harrowing experience with The Sigil, and I was just about at the point where I'd consider leaving the inn on my own. Jorge had even confirmed that morning that he was now confident that we'd face no retaliation, and it was safe for us to move about unaccompanied, though he did emphasise we make sure others know where and for how long we would be gone.

'Rule 1 – no duels' was instituted once more, with a much greater emphasis than before. Jorge had left no room for doubt, saying, "I don't care if whatever bastard of a god that summoned you here comes down from the heavens themselves and offers you a free punch. No. Fighting."

I'd asked if it mattered if they had no scars and no arms, and I'd gotten a soft cuff across the back of the head for the trouble, but that was the price of annoying your friends.

Over the last two days, Jorge and Nathlan had also both clubbed together to help me with the designs for the weapons I'd been working on, and we'd ventured down to Sally's workshop once more to get firm plans drawn up. Vera had stayed to work with the councillor for an extra day after discovering his love for pottery, and his experience as a seller of fine art. She had apparently spent most of a day showing him her collection and discussing plans to sell some of it to the great and the good in Colchet, to which Vera was both understandably proud and inexplicably embarrassed by.

Jorge had also managed to get the information out of the broker on the Crimson Lion safehouse, and we had plans to hit it tonight. Jorge had wanted us to get all our business in the city squared away before the raid, since 'things have a way of failing if you only plan for success'.

As luck would have it, I received word from Sally that my weapons were ready that same afternoon, and I skipped my way down to her shop later with a smile on my face and anticipation in my heart. I was so excited, in fact, that I didn't pay attention to the people around me, as Jorge had been teaching me these past two days. I didn't clock the two men that had been tailing me most of the way from the inn to Sally's shop. Didn't think to wonder what they were looking for that took them across two layers of the city without stopping to buy anything, nor why they had their hoods pulled tight despite the heat of the day.

Who could blame me though? The sun was shining high above, I was flush with money to buy my new weapons, and we were only a day away from leaving the bustle and heading back out into the wild country above. I'd been through some harrowing times recently, but things were looking up.

I arrived at Sally's workshop in good time and was nearly giddy as I pushed open the door to the chime of the needlessly elaborate bell. Who puts a clockwork mechanism on a doorbell? What would that even do? The thoughts were snatched from my mind though as Sally's high-pitched voice started babbling at me in a rapid cadence, reminding me of a duck's feet slapping the floor as it runs.

"About bleedin' time ya made it back here, ya little bastard! All mornin' I've been waitin' for a knock at my door, and in strolls you looking lost as a lamb! Is that why they call ya that?"

Rather than be offended by the barrage, I grinned, recognising the excitement on her face as a mirror to my own. She shuffled over to a bench in the corner, shucking a heavy leather quilt to reveal my two new weapons. She did so with a flourish, clearly pleased with her work, but I couldn't appreciate her jubilant smile as my eyes were drawn instead to the artifacts before me.

A heavy bronze-alloy shield rested firmly on the table, circular and lightly concave to bleed momentum from a deflected strike rather than stop it outright. Six lines radiated outwards from the boss in the centre, splitting the shield into equal segments.

It looked smooth, polished to a shine and strong despite its relatively thin edge. Speaking of the edge, it was tapered slightly but not sharp enough to cut. When driven with force it would surely do damage, but more in the way of a steel bar to the face breaking a nose than a sword slicing through bone. This also enabled it to be braced against armour or the environment without issue and wouldn't harm a weapon braced against its rim in turn.

All in all, from the front it looked like a fairly unremarkable, if well-made shield.

I picked it up from the table and slipped my left arm into the straps, cinching it tight. Other than the magically-treated alloy it was made from, the real magic of this weapon could be seen from behind. Small, intricate gearing ran beneath the rim inside the shield, made from the same bronze-coloured metal. There was no button or trigger with which to activate the contraptions, as I had been briefed by Sally in her letter, but I still found myself a little sceptical it would work. Nathlan had been over the process of claiming magical artifacts the night prior with me, but it was one thing to know and another entirely to experience.

I waited for a nod from Sally to show I had permission to proceed, but she just rolled her eyes and waved me on. I focused on my core, entering that strange meditative state of being where I visualised my soul, feeling the mana filling my core, incorporeal potential just waiting to make its mark on the physical world.

I lingered for a few moments, simply enjoying the sensation of feeling magic – magic! – flow through me, before I reached out. Reaching past my core, towards the celestial tapestries that hung above, the constellations dim and inactive, frozen in time without mana to feed their frenetic whirling. Then further. Beyond even the path-bound aura Skill I had that dominated the 'sky' of my soul, looming over all my Skills like a judge.

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My human senses failed me as I pushed further, unable to see past the dimly lit patterns of my Skills. But there was something there, just on the edge of my soul-space. I could feel an aberration, in some sense I couldn't name. A smudge in the darkness.

Straining, I searched as if combing the bed of a muddy pond. A few endless moments passed before I latched onto something. Further examination of the feeling yielded a dim light, rapidly brightening as I focused on it.

Recalling the instruction from Nathlan, I spun a small trickle of mana from my core, guiding it towards the flickering light that rested just past the edge of my soul-space, and finally making contact. I wrapped it around the light, pulling it back towards my soul-space.

There was more resistance than I'd anticipated, the seemingly empty void outside of my soul tugging at the artifact as I brought it past the frozen lights and into my soul-space proper, but a moment later I felt the connection snap into place abruptly. An awareness of the artifact branded itself into my soul, and I knew immediately and intimately how to activate the shield's functions.

I couldn't resist demonstrating anyway, and one look at Sally's face told me she'd likely kill me if I left without showing off what she had spent the last few days working on. Grinning, I fed another trickle of mana into the weapon, willing the gears in the top-most segment into action. There was a brief delay caused by my relatively poor mana-control, but as soon as the mana entered the connection within my soul, the shield responded.

A whisper of metal sliding against metal and the rim of the shield retracted into itself, leaving a gap at the top of the shield, almost like a crenelation in a tower. I stepped aside and angled my arm, imagining my opponent's weapon snared against the now-jagged edge of my shield and pulled out of line. Another thought and brief flex of mana and the shield returned to its previous, unbroken circular shape.

"So… What d'ya think?" Sally said with a grin. She could surely see the eagerness in my eyes, and it was mirrored by her own pride in her work. "I couldn't get anythin' 'cept the edges ta retract or change shape without weakenin' the metal too much, I'm afraid, but I think the speed and smoothness of the change at the edges is impressive enough ta make up for it. I doubt many opponents o' yours will be able to see it coming."

I nodded, activating the shield a few more times as I stepped through some quick forms. My mind was already busy planning certain combinations of strikes to leave certain counters open that I could then exploit. A weapon like this would open up new traps and tricks that I could work into my style, and I couldn't wait to try them out.

"Havin' only the outer edge retractin' also means ya can activate any o' the segments together. Hells, you could retract the whole fuckin' thing all at once, and that might even make up for some o' the weakness in materials. Smaller shield but twice as thick, ya see?"

I nodded in understanding, eager to return to my friends and plan some sparring and training in to familiarise myself with the new potential.

"Try the spear, try the spear!" The tiny woman barked, her excitement making me laugh as I reached for the spear.

There was less engineering that had gone into this weapon, at least visible on the surface. A plain shaft of the 'living wood' so prevalent in the stone city of Colchet, its swirls and whorls tracing a chaotic pattern up the haft, before disappearing under a metal coat of hammered copper-alloy covering the end. The artificial light reflected off the golden patina and I traced its curve as my gaze moved up to the spearhead itself.

A double-edged blade, clearly inspired by the lanceolate shape of the leaves of the Ereshal but strictly shaped for function over form. It was around a foot long, thicker and wider at the base and tapering to a slim point the colour of burnished bronze. There were no obvious seams along the metal of the blade that I could see upon close examination, and I raised an eyebrow at Sally in question.

"Don't give me that look! I tried what ya suggested but after messin' about for far too long at the drawin' bench, I couldn't figure out a way ta do it without riskin' the blade crumpling when tryin' to pierce somethin' dense. Don't despair though, young man! There's a reason ya' come to a professional like ma 'self. I figured the extra reach could come from the haft jus' as easy as the blade, right? So go on, claim it and give it a whirl!"

I shrugged, trusting to her ingenuity if nothing else, and went through the same process as before to claim the spear. It was a little easier this time, whether because the artifact was simpler or because I was more experienced, I couldn't be sure. Either way, less than a minute later I had my second claimed artifact in hand, and I fed a sliver of mana to the weapon.

The copper housing clunked, and an extra half a foot of metal emerged from the casing, extending the reach of the weapon substantially. My eyebrows rose at the speed of it.

Sally cackled with joy. "Exactly hun! Now jus' remember that the extra reach only extends from the top o' the spear, not the bottom. Not sure if that's an issue really but worth keeping in mind."

I ignored the obvious point and tried not to take the patronisation to heart. Instead, I focused on the brilliance of the weapon itself. It would be a standard upgrade to my current spear anyway based on the materials and craftsmanship, but the spring-loaded mechanism at the top of the haft would add an extra surprise for somebody facing me for the first time. Like with the shield, most of the advantage would come from fighting people, given animals and monsters tended to fight aggressively and without much regard for distance management, but that was where I needed the help, anyway.

My style of fighting was similar – overwhelm my opponents with aggression and physicality. I had high enough endurance to outlast most people at my current level range, but if they could survive my initial onslaught for more than a few moments, they were likely much more skilled given general advantage in attributes. In that case, I'd need to keep some tricks up my sleeve to disrupt anyone who could feel out my distance and timing. An extra foot of reach suddenly appearing would surprise most, and the ability to grapple and snare weapons with my shield would likewise increase my survival odds against a superior foe.

I grinned down at Sally, clapping her on the shoulder after putting down my commissions and reaching into my pocket for the payment. She tried some token haggling, but I simply handed over the exact amount mentioned in the invoice, and she accepted with only some minor grumbling.

I knew it was more an act than anything though, since she offered to bind my spear and shield properly, as per the guards' rules, and gave me some oil for the weapons, as well as a more specific mixture for the mechanisms in both artifacts. A flurry of maintenance instructions that left my head spinning were recorded on a small scroll and tucked into my waistband, and I was off out the door with a bulging bag over one shoulder and a cheery wave behind me.

I barely managed to look around before I took off back to the inn, humming to myself happily as I let my thoughts prance around inside my head, simulating new katas and movements I could link together for a more cohesive fighting style that made the most of my new artifacts.

So it was with a smile that I crashed to the cobbles, my skull cracked from the force of the blow I hadn't seen coming. Blood barely had a chance to well up from the wound before my body was picked from the street like an apple from a basket.

Vague sensations flittered through my mind, but delirious as I was, I noticed none of it, my consciousness having retreated as I was carried over a shoulder and spirited away through city streets I wouldn't have recognised even had my eyes been working.

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