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Chapter 534: Once Again

His face warped into an even uglier, sadistic smile. Seth quickly assessed the situation. Although the road was clean, he smelled blood in the air. This situation seemed familiar…

He had just spotted the gut-wrenching sight of an oak tree covered in severed heads when the beast introduced itself.

“Traveler! I am Orbas, the Mighty. I challenge you to a match! Best me in a competition of fist, speed, or wrestling or I won’t let you pass!” he bellowed confidently.

Was this guy even sane? Didn’t he see what Seth was riding on? Why would he accept a duel, especially when he had an inkling of what happened to the losers.

The blacksmith had to admit, that Orbas had guts, or he had maxed out his delusion attribute. No matter what it was, he had made a mistake. Maybe the worst of the determinedly short rest of his life.

It wasn’t picking a fight with Seth. He had introduced himself.

~The audacity! There is only one Mighty in this world. It is I, Puffles, the Mighty!~ The telepathic outrage echoed across the land, making Orbas stumble back and almost fall. The nightmare centipede’s massive head shot out before the brute had a chance to realize what was going on.

A crunch, a splash, and a headless body fell to the ground. It went so fast, even Seth only realized what the Ivicer was about to do, the moment it happened. The blacksmith felt no sympathy for the murderous highwayman.

He had suffered the same fate as his victims, though it was debatable what was worse. Having your head severed and hung on a tree or having it bitten off and digested by a giant insect. Seth could only shrug his shoulder, he didn’t know the answer to that.

Before the blacksmith continued he did two things. One was to collect the soul Orbas had dropped after his violent death.

The soul of a competitive person. All physical attributes will slightly increase in a duel or competition 1v1.>

The man was nothing to be admired, but his soul was quite interesting and Seth decided to put it to good use. After collecting his spoils, he went over to the tree.

It fit one of the myths of Apollo. On the tree hang many heads. The bodies of their owners were strewn over the ground in the small thicket behind it. The bodies of travelers and merchants. There were even horses and carts hidden between the trees.

There was not a lot the blacksmith could do for them. He didn’t have the time to bury them, or the space to collect their corpses. He freed the animals and set their bodies and the oak tree on fire. At least their bodies wouldn’t be eaten by wild animals this way.

He waited for the pale blue flame to do its work and buried the ashes of the bodies and the oak using earth magic. It was the best he could do with his limited time. When he mounted Puffles again, he halted for just a moment, before also burning the body of orbas.

“What?” he exclaimed, seeing he had gotten a title for burning and burying corpses. He didn’t quite know what it meant and the title didn’t have any effect. Maybe he would ask Simon or the Princess about it later if he remembered.

…

“Well, that was anticlimactic,” Seth commented dryly.

“You know, if you already lay these little games, you should at least make them a little harder” the god of destruction and chaos mocked Apollo.

At this point, it was clear that the god of sunlight had tweaked a few things to test the little blacksmith. Apollo didn’t seem fazed by the criticism.

“It was still kinda fun.” Hermes still supported Apollo.

“Yeah, but what was with that title?” Apollo wasn’t hung up on missing out on watching a fist fight. He was asking the real questions. A bunch of Olympian heads turned to look at a hooded figure who was sitting in the row behind them.

“What?” the system god asked disinterestedly. The gods kept staring at him as he shoved a hand full of popcorn into the darkness under his hood.

“It was on a whim, okay? Stop staring. Don’t you people see it as barbaric and an offense to the gods, to not bury a body even if it’s an enemy?”

Of course, after interacting with many worlds, they didn’t judge anyone for following customs they didn’t know. Still, despite having long left behind any notion of enforcing such laws on worlds they didn’t control, they appreciated the system god’s thought to commemorate following them.

“Well, it’s also a funny contrast to his title as a “Burning Savage” Hephaestus pondered.

The other gods all had expressions of “So that was the reason.”, while the blacksmith god could feel a piercing glare from behind, drilling into the back of his skull.

Did he expose something he shouldn’t have? Maybe it would have been better to stay silent…

…

The City of Day was built similar to the city of Dawn. The only exception was that the houses in this place were built mostly from yellow sandstone and other brighter stone.

Since he was already here, Seth once again visited the temple. This time it wasn’t filled with musicians looking for inspiration. The people sitting around with empty eyes and empty pieces of paper in their hands were poets and writers.

This time the blacksmith was approached by an old man. Again he stated his business and again he was left to wait. At least poets were mostly silent or just quietly mumbling during their practice. The priest came back a few minutes later.

According to him the unrest in the garden of Apollo had already calmed. What did this mean? Did Scorpio settle down? Or did it leave the forest?

Slightly annoyed, the blacksmith thanked the priest and left. He would still have to explore the forest to make sure, but not today. The night was falling, and Seth was tired. So he decided to stay in the city.

Sitting alone in the dining area of the pub slash inn he stared down at the table full of delicious-smelling food.

The sight and smell of these exotic dishes made his mouth water. The food was really good and the ale also tasted great but something was missing. The room around was rowdy with happy people eating and drinking, but Seth felt a bothering silence.

Right, there were no Fin, or Mina, or any of the others. Solitude had never bothered him but somehow, over the past two years, he had gotten used to not being alone. And he wasn’t just being alone. The hustle and bustle of his life were somewhere out there and possibly in terrible danger.

What if something happened to them while he was stuck here?

~Mom? Are you okay?~ Tatzel asked meekly.

~What? Yeah, of course!~ he chugged the tankard of ale as if to prove to the worried snakelet that everything was fine.

~Don’t force it. It’s okay. We will find that thing tomorrow and return post haste. ~ the Ivicer

~Right, it’s just… I won’t be able to share this with Mina or compete over it with Fin.~

~Why not, just bring some along and share it with them, when we return.~ Puffles stated the obvious solution.

~You are right! Let’s do that.~ Seth said in a better mood.

He was a lot happier thinking about what to do when they reunited than worrying about the alternative.

He ordered a lot more and packed most of it in his inventory for later before going to his room for some sleep.