The Author's POV

Rumble—

With a low rumble, the ground shook and the doors of Henlour opened up.

Without saying anything, we entered the gates.

"Welcome back."

Greeting us at the entrance of the city was another dwarf. By now, most people already knew who we were, and hence, whenever they saw us, they would greet us.

"Thank you."

Greeting them back, we once again entered the city.

Rumble—

It wasn't long before a low rumble sounded again and the gates closed shut behind us.

"Go get some proper rest. We will start our preparations for the elven domain over the next few days."

"Got it."

The first thing we did was go back to our own residences to get changed.

Having stayed in the nearby forests for over a month, everyone needed to get a proper bath.

Although our tents were indeed advanced, they still didn't have showers built in them. As such, whenever someone needed to wash, they would need to go to a nearby river to get cleaned.

Actually, I did briefly pass by Henlour a week ago to talk to Malvil about my sword, so it was only a week for me.

"Huam."

Once I arrived at my residence and separated myself from the others, I headed for the shower.

Turning the valve on, I let the warm water fall on my tired body, which had a couple of scars on them, before i relaxed completely.

Once I was done with the shower, drying my hair with a clean towel, I sat on the bed.

As I sat down, the water droplets that dropped down from my body traced down my toned body before they reached the clean bedsheets, wetting them.

"Let's see if anyone contacted me during all this time."

Opening my desk drawer, I took out my watch and booted it on.

Since there was no signal outside of the city as the dwarves tried to limit most outside communications, I had no idea about what had happened while I was gone.

It wasn't even a moment before a long string of text appeared on my watch. All of them coming from the same individual.

"Oh, Malvil called me."

'Is he finished with the sword?'

Him calling me only meant one thing: the sword was almost ready.

After the incident with Inferno, and after spending nine months improving my swordsmanship, I was finally able to convince him into forging a sword for me.

Not many had such a privilege, and so I was very happy with this development.

"That aside, I also feel much better now that I no longer have the tracking device inside of my head working."

Thanks to Jomnuk's coaching, Ryan was able to develop to the point where he could now easily hack into my chip and tamper with the device.

He could turn it on and off whenever he wanted to. This was a great piece of news to me as I could definitely make do with it in the future.

Especially at the conference where I was going to meet up with the Union.

With the chip tracking device off, they would of course be unable to tell that I was 876, but for sure I was going to let them understand that they had messed with someone extremely petty.

Well, that was granted if the opportunity for it came. If there wasn't, I could just wait for later.

'Right, that fucker will also be there…'

Recalling a certain face inside of my memories, my lips tugged upwards.

'I've still got quite the score to settle with you, don't I?'

was someone whom I hated much more than the Union, it would be none other than the individual that brought me to 'that

pain I

of my teeth grinding together

"Huuuu."

a deep breath, trying to calm

a time for everything and now was not

and quickly getting changed, I headed for the door of my

Cli- Clank—

my priority should be visiting Malvil and seeing how much he progressed

with a new sword, especially since the ones I have been using weren't the

***

the fourth level, it would without a doubt be

the earth's core, it

I went there, it would feel as though I was inside a steaming hot

wasn't pleasant, to say the

"You're finally here, human!"

the main building of the facility center, Malvil came

there talking to the secretary,

done a couple of days ago." He grumbled,

"That fast?"

sounded quite annoyed, but

training instead of anything else. Though, I was impressed by

"Follow me."

secretary, Malvil brought me

like in the previous times that I had been there, it was a mess. With equipment sprawled all over the place and scrap pieces of metal on the floor, it looked as

Stepping over the garbage, we

Thump—

was covered in a thin white cloth onto the

the cloth and my eyes paused on the sword,

the

me a while to process the…sword in front of me, if it could even be called

nothing like it. Rather, it looked more like a

that would make it look like a sword,

tell me that he

would never show me something like this unless there was something more

looked up to Malvil who was looking at

his finger forward and tracing it over the body of the piece of metal, Malvil

"How beautiful…"

You call that thing

those words out loud but I managed to keep my

couple of minutes passed that

almost lost

with a forceful

what's with

it appeared that my face was quite obvious as

a show of peace, I calmly replied, "Nothing. I was just curious if

"Of course it is."

his small hand on the

pointed towards the long piece of

this is the frame

could tell

ignorance is such

his back before walking towards another counter and picking up a small white hammer that

to walk towards the sword

me one last glare, he handed me the

understand once you

to me?" I asked, confusion dying my face. Why in the world was he

"Just take it."

the hammer

"Now hammer the sword!"

how serious he was being, I calmed myself down quickly and stared at

without wasting any more time, raising my hand which held onto the hammer, I prepared

mana before you do

before I could even swing downwards, Malvil's voice traveled through

"Got it."

all of my mana into the

Vooom—!

on the hammer's side suddenly started to glow, lighting up the room in

the metal frame, Malvil shouted, "Now!