It was a fresh day when Seth returned to the workshop. Yesterday was very eventful and his little outing to purchase a soul had taken much longer than he had expected. After hunting demons over the day, he had helped Tano’Mol move to the embassy of Minas mar, using Legion.

After explaining everything to Mary it was already evening. Instead of working deep into the night, Seth had returned to the sweet embrace of his girlfriends and enjoyed the evening with them. Since Mike and Lydia were on their own little missions, the Field Teams were mostly on break, meaning Mina and Fin were not stuck in dungeons all the time, making going home early very attractive.

Still, he had work to do and that was why he returned today. The shield for Bement was still waiting to be finished. As Sandra has suggested, the soul of Azzo seemed to more or less fit the bill.

The soul of a high-ranking Leonide demon called Azzo. A powerful demoness known for her advanced skills in combat mixed with basic earth elemental sorcery. Affinity: Combat skills, Earth-type skills. Active Skill: Lion's Roar. Trait: Predator’s Rule>

The bill fit pretty well. Even the trait was quite good as it was similar to Seth's Dragon Might

The aura of coercion of a King of the jungle. Surrounding hostiles are slowed and weakened depending on the difference in willpower.>

This was always a welcome skill for a tanker.

The only problem was that the blacksmith was simply too good. had preserved the ego of the demoness and she obviously would not be very happy about becoming an equipment. Of course, there was always the possibility of turning her into a golem since he had her body. But did he want a demon golem?

He couldn’t deny that doing that and giving her the Khopesh was tempting, just for the coolness factor. A scarred, muscular Lioness warrior, wielding two dark sabers? He would have bet money that it would get a blessing from the Heliopolian gods.

The problem was her ego and her origins. If Seth were to turn her into a golem, he would try to preserve some of her personality. The blacksmith had made great advancements in manipulating the makeup of the soul and was almost confident in manipulating an ego by erasing specific parts. But demons were not to be trusted.

Demons were experts of the soul, even if he erased her ego completely, who was to say she did not have a recovery partition he did not see? Or some external means to re-imprint her personality and memories onto the soul?

Turning her into an autonomous golem was too risky. Using her on equipment held much lower risks. Even if she managed to recover her original ego through some means, she would still be just an item, without any power to act on its own. At best, she would annoy the user by talking to them.

Before Seth started futzing around with the very content of her being, he gave Azzo the chance to talk, as he did with the soul of the seductress.

~ Azzo, can you hear me? ~

~Who are you and what are you doing with my soul!?~ a deep, smooth female voice asked upset.

~I’m the blacksmith who will give you a new body. ~

~What? What nonsense are you spouting? Release me and I can return to my original body! ~

~Ah, you see, that won’t happen. Some glutton consumed all the earth-type souls in town and left nothing for the hard-working laborer like me. I took your soul as a substitute and reparations. ~

The soul fell silent for a moment.

~You are with Tano’Mol, aren’t you? You are the guy who bought Vanessa’s soul and used it in your music! ~ she concluded after the moment of silence.

~Shit, that also means you are the guy who summoned Mussa Pract’ish!~ she suddenly exclaimed in a small panic.

~You are pretty well-informed. ~ Seth commented, feeling a little awkward about the change in her voice.

~I- I have no skill with singing or music! My soul is absolutely useless to a bard like you. ~ she tried to argue

~You are right, that’s why I will turn you into a shield. The reason I’m talking to you is to give you a chance to preserve your ego. A complete ego is always a pro for an item, as long as the ego is cooperative. If you aren’t cooperative, I will have to start messing around with your soul until you are. ~ Seth left no doubt about the consequences of saying no.

~W-What is the deal? There has to be a deal, right? ~ she asked desperately. It seemed like she had already let go of the notion of resistance. Now she was trying to negotiate the best outcome for herself.

~ It’s simple, really.~

The demonic bard offered her the same deal as he did to the mask. She would not have to accept anyone she didn’t like as her carrier, unless Seth said so. In addition, she was given the special right to try and escape the bounds of the shield, if she was to ever come into the possession of someone not part of Minas Mar.

Seth simply added this because he was 90% sure that a powerful demon like her had a workaround, even if her soul was properly sealed or, in this case, reborn as an item. He didn’t feel like trying to convince her to stay an item for eternity, so he threw that clause in to sweeten the deal.

She agreed, albeit reluctantly. They signed the soul contract that would bind them to their promise and Seth was free to work her soul however he wanted.

~Do you have any favorite song or poem?~ he asked as he was thinking of how to enchant her soul.

~ I will Survive..?~

~Hmm...~

…

---Beta, Thres---

Mike was not overly enthusiastic over the sudden side mission. Lydia on the other hand was quite happy about the chance to keep traveling with her boyfriend for a while longer. Although it was hard to comprehend, why Seth would send them reinforcements, especially some unhinged parrot-like Ceres.

Of course, they would never dare to call the mechanical lightning eagle a parrot in its face. Just one of the signs of its power. To Lydia’s even greater joy, they would have some downtime alone since Seth asked them to stay at Thres until the golem reached the city.

“You can stay with the priestesses, we have prepared a building for guests to stay and there are enough free rooms,” the guide, one of the guards that had received them at the entrance, told them.

Compared to the ruins just outside the barrier, they had already gotten quite far in the restoration of Thres. But when complimented on their progress by one of the priestesses, the guard grimaced a little.

“On the surface, we are doing well, but the underground is the real problem,” he said conflicted about whether he should tell them, in the end, he did.

On the surface they already blocked portals, were managing dungeons, and had restored quite a lot of buildings. Their problems began when they tried to reconquer the subterranean floors of the district, where most of the maintenance and infrastructural facilities were found.

Water treatment plants, power plants, waste disposal, and food production had all been moved below the city, to save living space in the tightly populated districts. It was a great solution at the time they were built when not every dark nook could turn into a dungeon or harbor beasts.

“We have already walled off the entrances to Thres’ underground from other cities and maintenance tunnels, but these weird monsters keep appearing, some of them can hardly be killed. I’m sure you saw a few of them on the way, right? Not even Adam knows anything about them...” the guard lamented.

They had silently been following the man as he talked and quickly arrived at a square, surrounded by a group of high risers. The guard pointed to one of them, which seemed like a hotel or an expensive apartment tower.

“You can stay in this place. Our arcanists and the crew from little Sigma already managed to repair and upgrade roughly 80% of it,” he commented on the side. With upgrades he was talking about arcane security systems like a barrier that protected the building

“You are the warriors from Minas Mar, right?” he held back Mike and Lydia, as the priestesses started entering the building, following a guard acting like a porter. The couple nodded in unison.

“Would you please follow me for a moment? Governor Adam wanted to have a meeting with you.