Holton was a nation of predominantly wood mages. But they used a variation of the wood magic to make and control puppets. Although Reginald didn't have much information, he also told them about the secret technique that the Holtons possessed, controlling people and corpses.

The last time Holton attacked Lorvale was about 24 years ago, a time when Lorvale reigned supreme in this region. The combined army of Lorvale's clans was five times today's strength.

Reginald was just a foot soldier at that time, a man who just became a journeyman level magic user, he still remembered the day of the invasion as if it was yesterday.

Reginald was among the group of soldiers who were guarding the abandoned Greyston town, The villagers have already retreated to Goldfair city hearing about the border towns falling into enemy hands. Reginald's group only had a single command, unless they had a command otherwise, destroy anything that tried to leave Grayston towards the Lorvale Kingdom, whether they were friends or foes, dead or alive.

He was not sure what to make of this command from the higher-ups, killing traitors and wimps who deserted the battlefield was considered normal. But this command had forbidden anyone, even if they were deadly injured to retreat. He stood atop the city gates, his eyes staring at the pathway in between the mountains that led to Grayston.

The attachment of army that had advanced into the battlefield last week was now retreating. Soldiers began gathering in the town from the frontlines. The stench of blood thickened the air.

Tens of thousands of men filled the streets near the Western gate of the town, many were panting from the long walk, some chanted prayers, a man astute atop a hairy elephant gave out commands to the soldiers.

After a few hours, a rumbling noise came from the path that the soldiers have retreated through, followed by tens of thousands of wooden puppets wearing armor. The armor of the puppets in the forefront was stained with blood, though they had none.

The noise was metal and wood colliding with each other as the puppets marched.

Reginald expected as much, he knew he would be primarily fighting puppets in this battle. But what he hadn't expected was the many Lorvale soldiers walking along the puppets, their eyes had lost all its luster as if they had no soul. The soldiers were wounded, heavily. Many had the weapons they were attacked with still stuck on their body, blood dripping from the wounds.

now Reginald understood the command, it was not meant for the retreating soldiers, but for these... dead soldiers?

His heart pounded out of the fear. Not the fear of death, but the dread of becoming one of these soulless human puppets. Slaying his own kin and kind, slaughtering through the land that he vowed to protect.

Following them, there were animals, some made of wood, others, real ones. Many of them were mounted by mages in armor, their eyes shining brightly in green.

The siege of Grayston lasted for a week, The opening outside the city walls was essentially a meat grinder. Tens of thousands fell dead on Lorvale's side. A mountain of wood and metal formed from all the puppets that were destroyed.

Then the Kingdom of Holton was taken over. The new King was not a conqueror, he made the nation prosper and didn't respond to the calls for war from within his court.

That man was murdered by his own son, who wanted the nation to be back to its old self.

And now Holton, which was at its peak of prosperity wanted to take on Lorvale, again.

Hearing all this Robert's urge to make more weapons and grow Grayston only increased. The passage of time Has weekend Lorvale Kingdom, but that was not the scary part. The Holton Kingdom was at war, internally or externally for a long time before that Siege. And that nation has been in a state of prosperity and peace for more than two decades.

'What if they haven't ceased the production of puppets?' 24 years of production, if they went all out, how large of an army will Lorvale be facing? The danger from the unknown mind control technique was also there.

He didn't want to lose the town he owned, he didn't want the people in Westfae or Goldfair to suffer either. He decided to push his original plans to the side for now.

The meeting continued for about three hours. And most of the time was taken by Robert asking and understanding many things about Lorvale and Holton. Robert deligated most of the day to day management of the town to the council, now he could focus more on innovative things rather than the mundane town management.

'There's no reason to develop this town if there will be no town to hold on to in the future,' Robert thought. But first, he had to confirm the rumors of the war.

'Guess I'll take a trip to Goldfair city tomorrow, maybe Sophy can confirm this'

"Hey, Nenand! can you tell me who's the best weaponsmith in town? I want someone good with mechanisms" Robert turned back and asked Nenand who was walking out of the town hall a distance behind him.

"Oh! sure," Nenand replied, then scratched his head as he thought of who was the best. Then his eyes lighted up and continued.

"It'd be grandpa Sharpe!"

"Sharpe?" A fitting name for a weaponsmith, Robert thought.

"Let's go, his shop is a little... out of the way," Nenand said.

"Gramps is a bit weird, but I'm sure he'll like you" Nenand continued, with a smirk.

Last time Nenand went there to get a sword forged, this Sharpe made him wait for a month. And finally, when it was ready, Nenand was dumbfounded by what his commission has turned into.

This man Sharpe had forged him a flexible sword with Iron Lizard scales. It was sharper than a normal sword and even transformed into a normal short sword. But Nenand couldn't handle it. He had cut himself with this blade almost everytime he tried to learn it.

It was not like Nenand was not talented or lazy, his power level and skills in shortsword attested to this. But without proper training or manual, this short sword was not useful for him in any way.

And Sharpe had made him pay the price even though he didn't make what Nenand had asked for. This made Nenand hate this old man for a while, but when he tried to appraise it in Goldfair city, he came to know that these swords sold for almost three times what this gramps has charged him. And the one he had was a top class one.

Nenand still trained with the flexible sword every day, but had made the old man forge another regular shortsword for him. This time he left instructions on exactly what he wanted, and it turned out exactly how he wanted it to be.

The town lord was also like Sharpe, making new weird weapons. But his was more usable and deadly.

Nenand and Robert walked through many twisting alleys before they reached a shopfront. The shop was quite unremarkable.

"You sure this is the place?" Robert asked Nenand with a questioning face.

"Haha, yes, this is grandpa Sharpe's house," Nenand replied.

Walking into the shop Robert's jaw dropped in amazement. The display of weapons in the shelf, although small in number, was able to instantly give him the confidence he needed about grandpa Sharpe.

There were many different weapons, all having some special mechanisms in the shelf. A longsword that had springloaded smaller blades that adorned its blade, Shurikens that could be wound up to increase power, there were many weapons,

The ones that caught Robert's eye was a crossbow, Although it was a crossbow, it resembled him of a minigun. The crossbow bolts were contained in a round magazine, already wound up and ready to go.

This was exactly the person Robert was looking for. Robert walked to the counter where an old man, at least 60 years old was tinkering with a yo-yo like thing, the old man carefully folded the six blades that extended from the yo-yo to inside and closed the shell that was open in one side.

Finishing what he had been doing Sharpe looked up from the table.

"Ah! Nenand? " Sharpe was excited to see a customer, but when it turned out to be Nenand, he was disappointed.

"Hello, Grandpa Sharpe!" Nenand greeted him with a bright smile.

"I am done making stuff for you Nenand, Short swords are boring" Sharpe was surely annoyed by Nenand, He didn't like making uninspiring things, and shortsword was as boring as they came.

"It's not for him Mr. Sharpe its for me, I'm Robert", Robert greeted himself.

"Nice to meet you Robert, But I stopped making stuff from drawings or descriptions telling me what to do, I can make something original if you want though."

"ahh.. well, would you at least take a look at this one," Robert said this and extended his hand, it held a paper with a drawing.

Sharpe took a glance and was about to outright reject Robert. He guessed it would be another sword or bow. but seeing some detailed technical drawing made him stare at the paper for a full minute.

Then he smiled and turned up and asked Robert

"You can call me Grandpa Sharpe. This fire rune can't even hurt a fly, and what is this thing exactly?"

"You know the miniature fire rune?" Darell had worked on this rune for days before he could develop it. This man was able to identify it immediately. Nenand was not exaggerating about him at all.

"It's a forgotten rune since it is mostly useless for any practical application" Grandpa Sharpe explained.

Robert explained guns and made a deal with Sharpe to make some machines. Sharpe agreed wholeheartedly.

What made Sharpe happy was that he was not going to create the mechanism from the paper. Although he liked that, it was too simple. He was entrusted with the job of creating a machine that created that mechanism.

An assembly line for the gun, Robert called it. And he also had to create a mechanism to make this thing explode if someone tried to dissect it.

Sharpe was overjoyed. So was Robert.