“Mecha? As in a big stompy robot?”

“I haven’t heard of the term ‘robot,’ but they are big and stompy Boss. You see in my world, we did battle in mana-infused suits. I was a head engineer for designing and crafting the death golems of war, and mainly focused on drafting experimental thoughts such as the pilot seat, alloy mixing, magic circuits, and mana fibers.”

“You can create such weapons?” Hope and great interest sparkled in Urists' eyes.

Grim could only shake his head and smile sadly, “If I had the tools, a workshop, and the materials, I could make the shell, sure. But without a Tier Four magic stone we can’t even make a small mecha run. At most we could craft magic stone gear, but I never studied that field so I wouldn’t know where to start. I just hoped to ask you, if you ever found such crystals, I hope you would think of my project idea and give it some thought.”

“Hm, if it’s the mechas I’m thinking of then I want you to design them on paper for the other smiths to see. I intend on expanding the forge later, so if we can plan around making mechas it would be great. Though I’d wish to see the designs before we commit to anything, understood?”

Hearing his reply, Grim bowed his head deeply, “Thank you, Boss, for listening to this fellow's selfish request.”

Seeing the man bow Urist motioned for him to raise his head. “You don’t need to do that, Grim. I wouldn’t be a good leader if I didn’t listen to my brothers' and sisters' requests. A courier will drop off the items you need to make the designs in your room. Is that all you request of me?”

“Yes Boss, thank you that will be all.”

The two shook hands and the group exited the room with the other smith leaders in tow. With a goodbye and a grinning group behind him, Urist got back to work.

Leaving the forge, Urist headed back outside to a small hut with two wind mages and a messenger sitting inside, lazing about.

Opening the door, Urist walked in, startling the two.

“Boss!”

“What do you need Sir?”

“I’m just checking on how you are doing in your new posts. It seems that… it must be boring if you're dozing off.”

“No! Not at all! Well… actually, it kind of is, Boss. I’ll be frank with you. Sitting here doing nothing while everyone works outside is pretty boring. We got a message from Hunter Team 01 that they killed more ferocious beasts and are heading back to base. And the newly created Hunter Team 02 is working on scouting the south. That new female lancer, Joy, seems to be leading the team well from their wind mage’s report. We already reported the messages to Ubel and Unicy. We would’ve also informed Volt, but he’s currently in meditation.”

Urist nodded, “Thank you for the report. I’ll be sure to have you guys rotated out more when we get more wind mages. In the meantime, I’ll think of a game you can play while waiting in between messages.”

“Thank you, Boss!”

“Aye, I was expecting punishment.”

“Oh? You want me to punish you? I mean if you insist you can join Thar who is tied up in a tree. How does a few hours of joining in on his woes sound after you finish your job for today?”

“N-no! Please don’t punish us, Boss! We’ll be better!”

“Haha! I’ll be going now, try not to sleep on the job anymore, alright.”

“Sir yes, Sir!”

After scaring the wind mages, Urist went up the stairs to meet with Ubel. It took him a bit, but he found him doing inspections on top of the newly constructed south wall that went all the way to the river. Currently, he was staring out into the unclaimed wilds, not paying attention to the dwarfs below and behind him clearing out the conquered piece of land.

Urist moved and stood next to Ubel, “You are a hard man to find.”

Instead of replying to Urist, Ubel asked a question, “So Urist, have you thought of what this event will bring? Primal Stone isn’t much to go on.”

Putting his hands in his pockets, Urist looked into the sky.

“No information I can really go on. The world chat has been equally confused about the meaning. Some think we’ll be fighting primitives. Others think it’s going to be a gamelike event, a race, or maybe it’ll be a prize we fight over. Many, many more guesses that Uria has been working through in her time scanning the boards.”

Ubel snorted at his response, “I didn’t ask you for others' opinions. I asked, what do you think will happen?”

Rolling his eyes Urist replied, “Testing me, are you? Very well, I feel that it’ll be a battle. Focusing on the word Primal, I feel that it means that at the roots it’s something that expresses the primal age, where unlike how language and diplomacy were for the civilized age, the rule of survival of the fittest reigned supreme.”

“And what of the meaning of stone?”

“I think stone means that it’ll be set in the stone age of the primal world. At the time where hominids first began to use tools. But I wonder if we’ll be the primitives or the invaders. Also, what would we be fighting?”

Giving a slow clap, Ubel flashed an ever so slight smirk, “Well done. You came to the same conclusion as me, but you still have a ways to go. Urist. I’ll give you my prediction right now. We’ll be neither the primitives or the invaders. We will be the tipping piece.”

“Tipping piece? Explain.”

“Well, my prediction comes from how you described Demon Descent not having the event tag after it.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“From that, we can assume that we will be invaded and it won’t be an event. It’ll be permanent. And since we are not advanced but also not primitive we are in the middle. I’m leaning on being the tipping point of the natives.”

“Wait, natives? How does that happen? You mean the-- oh. You don’t think.”

“Yes, Urist. We won’t be taking the event here.”

With a dramatic pause, he pushed up his glasses.

“We’ll be teleported to another plane of existence.”

Primal Stone Event timer activated 1 Day 12 Hours 34 Min

Mount Puff Event timer activated 15 Days 12 Hours 34 Min

Treasure Hunt Event timer activated 29 Days 12 Hours 34 Min

Weapon Fall Event timer activated 43 Days 12 Hours 34 Min

Demons Descent timer activated 57 Days 12 Hours 34 Min

Points: 20,621