The first thing that drifted into my awareness was warmth, and the echo of a forge throbbed inside my skull. Molten‑metal oranges and yellows still pulsed behind my eyelids, anvil‑ring collisions, the rasp of a file, the hiss of quench‑oil flaring into blue flame.
The knowledge was intoxicating and throbbing. A dull ache radiated from the base of my skull outward, as if my brain had expanded two sizes.
I cracked one eye open.
Sun‑gold sifted through the half‑broken stained‑glass windows of the abandoned church, painting the dusty pews in fractured color. Drafts rustled loose flyers on the far wall, and somewhere a warped rafter groaned. Someone had draped a thin blanket over me; it smelled faintly of Bell and a little like Hestia.
A gentle weight pressed against my left side. Turning my head, I saw Lady Hestia curled beside me on the threadbare couch. Her dark hair spilled across my shoulder like midnight silk, her face relaxed in sleep. Tiny snores puffed from her lips. One hand rested possessively on top of mine.
Beyond the slice of doorway that led to the nave, I heard talking, Bell's upbeat murmur, Lili's quick replies. The tread stopped; something clinked. A rustle of paper wraps. Breakfast, then. The scent drifted in a second later: fresh rye rolls, herb‑spiced broth, a hint of berry jam. My stomach answered with a humiliating growl.
Nyx, nested in the hollow of my knees under the blanket, poked her head out. She blinked sleep‑blue eyes and chirped a quiet "Nyarr?" I stroked her between the ears. I'm all right, I told her silently, just tenderized.
At that, the goddess beside me stirred. A soft grunt, a stretch, then sudden tension. Hestia's eyes popped open, crystalline blue snapping from drowsy to furious in half a heartbeat. She bolted upright, nearly clocking me with her hairpin.
"AMARA!" she hissed, volume low but absolutely volcanic. "You … scare me and the others half to death, and think you can just nap it off?!"
I opened my mouth; only a dusty croak emerged. "Morning to you, too, Lady Hestia." My smile felt lopsided.
She jabbed a finger at my forehead. "Don't 'morning' me! Bell told me everything the moment they dragged you in. Summoned monsters! Harvesting corpses, collapsing in public! Do you know what it did to my blood pressure?"
She placed a hand theatrically over her bustline, as if feeling for palpitations. In any other circumstance, I'd have laughed. I settled for sitting up slowly, Nyx hopping to the backrest to give us room.
Footsteps approached. Bell peeked around the jamb, balancing a tray piled with bread, a small pot of soup, and three steaming cups of tea. "Lady Hestia… she just woke up—uh—maybe food first?"
Lili slipped in behind him, arms full of rolled bandages and a cloth‑wrapped bundle of coins, our share from yesterday's crystal sales, no doubt. I hadn't kept track of the crystals, but I'm sure we ended up with more than 30 small ones. Her large eyes took in the scene, flicking from Hestia to me. She wisely stayed near the door, though the faintest smirk curved her mouth; apparently, seeing me on the receiving end of a scolding was novel entertainment.
Bell set the tray on a brittle end table that protested with a creak, then hurried to Hestia's side. "Lady Hestia, please don't get upset. Amara had to fight those monsters. Some kind of curse thing." He shot me an imploring glance. Please explain before she combusts.
I inhaled, steeling myself. The air tasted of hearth dust and wheat bread. "I'll explain," I said, voice steadier now. "I promise."
Hestia crossed her arms beneath her chest, foot tapping a staccato rhythm. "This explanation had better be good, young lady."
Young lady? From a goddess who looked fifteen at most? I swallowed the retort; no sense fueling the forge. "It's complicated. But first—" I reached for a cup, the chamomile‑mint steam soothing. "May I?"
She huffed an exasperated fine. I sipped, buying a few seconds. Bell offered a roll to Lili; she tore it neatly in half, slid one portion to Nyx (who devoured it like a starved gremlin), and nibbled the rest, gaze never leaving me. I guess shadows could eat, cause I'm sure they never felt hunger.
Lady Hestia waited, arms still folded. Her foot ceased tapping, a dangerous calm before the next eruption. They waited until I finished eating. "Start talking," she said, voice low enough to make dust quiver on the rafters. "All of it."
I took one last sip, then set the cup aside. "You remember the… the curse we talked about before," I began, glancing at Hestia, hinting at the outer god that had sent me here. She gave a terse nod. "Well, it likes to drop quests on me. Yesterday, one popped up while we were exploring."
Bell's brow furrowed. "Like the Falna missions, gods sometimes give?"
"Similar, I guess, I'm not sure what you mean by that honestly," I said. "The window said: Slay three rank‑one‑star monsters. Fail, and you're banished to a pocket plane for twenty‑four hours. Alone. Survive or don't."
Lili's shoulders tightened. "Dungeon exile? That's… that's not normal."
"Nothing about me is normal," I admitted. "But the curse is ironclad. I either finished the task or woke up somewhere far worse."
Bell's grip whitened on the tray. "So you summoned those Chatacabras because you had to fight them, with the power of your curse?"
"Exactly." I glanced at Hestia.
The goddess pinched the bridge of her nose. "And fainting?"
"Side‑effect." I rolled my aching shoulders. "The quest payout wasn't just loot. I couldn't handle it all and ended up passing out." I tapped my temple.
Hestia's anger sagged into exasperated relief. "Im glad you're okay."
I flashed a weak smile. "But… there's one more thing."
I rose, ignoring protesting muscles, and stepped into the center aisle where sunlight pooled. "Bell? Lili? Keep your distance." A mental nudge unfurled my shadow menu. I selected the larger of my trophies.
Shadows rippled like water. Bell braced instinctively. Darkness thickened, coalesced, and then the gold-crowned Chatacabra towered over us, teal stripes now rendered in glossy night. Its hunched shoulders brushed the rafters; saliva‑less jaws clacked once, soundless as stone. Nyx offered a pleased chirp and leapt onto its forearm.
Hestia folded her arms, trying and failing to look unimpressed. "Does it have to stay in here?"
"Actually, no." I lifted the storage belt I'd earned. A flick of will, and the colossal outline folded into ink and vanished, slipping back into an onyx buckle at my hip.
Lili sagged with it. "Ganesha Familia would pay a fortune to borrow that trick."
"Let's not tell them," I said dryly. Then, unable to resist, I tapped the belt. "Also I named him. Sir Froggie."
Silence.
Nyx slapped a paw over her tiny face. Bell sputtered a half‑laugh, half‑groan. Lili stared like I'd grown antlers. Hestia buried her own face in her hands. "By the hearth," she muttered, voice muffled. "All that drama and you call him Sir Froggie?"
"He's technically amphibious," I defended. "The name stuck."
Bell finally gave in, laughter spilling out until he had to set the tray down. Lili followed with a snicker, she tried to strangle. Even Hestia peeked between her fingers, lips twitching. The tension bled from the room.
When Bell could breathe, he wiped his eyes. "Okay. Cursed by the Dungeon, quests, fainted from overload… and Knighted Sir Froggie. Got it."
I bowed with a theatrical flourish. "At your service."
Hestia sobered first. She stepped close, placed both hands on my cheeks, and made me meet her gaze. "No more collapsing," she said softly. "If your quests threaten you, now we know why you have to do it."
Warmth bloomed behind my ribs. "Deal."
She nodded once, satisfied, and released me. "Good. Keep eating before the bread goes stale. Then we decide how to use the loads of monster hide and the six thousand valis you kept secret." A sharp look. "We're talking rent, repairs, maybe real beds."
Bell and Lili drifted into the nave to fetch more tea, leaving only the goddess and me in the patchwork sunlight.
Hestia watched me finish the last crust of bread, then dusted crumbs from her ribbon and cleared her throat, soft, almost shy, which meant trouble of a different sort.
"Listen," she said, twining a midnight lock around one finger, "we're taking today off from the Dungeon—Bell needs to get some gear, Lili wants to inventory those things you carved, and you're still walking like you're in pain."
"Fair," I admitted, rubbing the ache at the base of my neck.
"Good. Because a friend of mine asked to meet you."
She hesitated, gauging my face. "She heard rumors about a… turquoise metal you traded yesterday."
Machalite. "You mean Goddess Hephaestus."
Hestia's eyes brightened. "So the whispers reached even you. She's curious. And when 'Big Sis' gets curious about metal, entire districts tremble." A fond, exasperated smile curved her lips, equal parts pride and dread.
I swallowed. "So am I in trouble?"
"No, she just wants to talk," Hestia corrected gently. "To ask where it came from and test a sliver in her forge. Knowing her, maybe ask if you have any more odd ore."
Hestia pushed the empty teacup counter and patted the threadbare cushion in front of her knees.
"Falna time, miss. Shirt off."
I rolled my eyes but obeyed. The chill of the stone floor seeped through my knees as I knelt; Nyx hopped to the armrest, supervising. Hestia pricked her fingertip, just a pin's sting, then pressed it between my shoulder blades. Divine blood flared, runes blooming across my skin like molten silver.
A heartbeat later, light rolled off my back in ribbons, condensing into the parchment‑thin Status sheet that only a god could read. Hestia's breath hitched; she bit her lip to hide a grin.
"Look at this monster in Amazon skin," she murmured, and began reciting:
Name Amara
Race Amazon
Level 1
Blessing Shadow Monarch's Mark
Summon Slots 3 ( ↑ Sir Froggie earned you an extra slot )
Strength H 128 (+53)
Endurance H 117 (+48)
Dexterity H 105 (+50)
Agility H 121 (+60)
Magic H 103 (+71)
Skills
• Unlimited Inventory
• Little Miss Forge (NEW)
Magic
• Shadow Extract
The glowing sheet folded back into my skin; the warmth of new excelia thrummed through muscle and bone. I flexed a hand—stronger, faster, sharper, right. Hestia tapped my forehead.
"Letter‑grade jump across the board. Try not to give me more gray hairs, earning the next one, okay?"
"Deal," I said, pulling my shirt over freshly tingling shoulders. Bell all but bounced in place, and even Lili's careful mask cracked into an excited grin.
"Good," Hestia finished, swiping a speck of parchment light from her fingertips. "Because Hephaestus is waiting, and I'd rather present her a walking miracle than a wobbling wreck. Wash your face, strap up, and keep Sir Froggie in the buckle."
Nyx chirped approval, Lili gathered the coin pouch, and Bell offered me a victory roll stuffed with jam. I took a bite, sweet, sharp, alive, and followed my goddess toward the morning sun.
The church door creaked on its hinges as we stepped into Orario's mid‑morning bustle. The city smelled of rising bread, hot stone, and the tang of forge‑smoke drifting from the Craftsman's Row ahead. With every lungful, my pulse quickened: half memory, half new hunger.
Hestia cast me a sidelong look. "You're bouncing."
"Am not." My steps said otherwise, more hop than walk.
She chuckled. "Wait till you see Ephestos Main Forge. Twenty anvils, a heavenfire hearth, and half the Familia arguing about the perfect hammer weight."
We turned off the main artery into Craftsman's Row proper. Buildings here were taller, stone‑faced, and veined with copper exhaust flues. Signs of crossed hammers swung overhead. Apprentices dashed between workshops, lacquered scabbards under one arm and bundles of charcoal under the other.
Every doorway leaked some fragment of music: the ring of steel, the roar of a furnace, the sizzle of flux on hot billet. I breathed it like perfume. "How does anyone sleep with that chorus?"
"Smiths don't," Hestia said brightly. "They pass out in their leather aprons for two hours, then jump back up when inspiration bites. Or so I'm told."
A red‑lacquered arch loomed ahead, stamped with the sigil of a bent knee and hammer—the crest of Hephaestus. Twin bronze doors stood open, heat gusting out in waves strong enough to ruffle my tunic. Two sturdy dwarves in sleeveless jerkins straightened when they spotted Hestia, surprise melting into warm respect.
"Lady Hestia!" one greeted, wiping soot on a rag before offering a bow. His eyes flicked to me, curiosity swirling with appraisal.
Hestia beamed, the picture of radiance. "Morning, Brynn. Hephaestus expecting us?"
"She's in the demonstration hall," Brynn replied. "Big delivery for the Loki Familia, she'll finish shortly." He stepped aside, motioning us through. "Take the main aisle. Don't touch the cooling racks."
I managed a polite nod, but most of my brain was already scattering, trying to drink in everything at once. The main forge stretched like a cathedral: a forest of chimneys, balconies lined with weapon racks, overhead cranes hauling glowing ingots along rails that sparked where wheels met track. Dozens of smiths labored at individual hearths, the glow painting their faces gold.
Hestia guided me along a mezzanine, high enough that I could see a river of molten slag sluicing beneath grates in the stone. "Ephestos recycles everything," she said over the din. "Waste not, want not."
Gemma‑memory purred agreement: impurities skimming, slag chemistry… I nearly veered into a rack of half‑finished spears, mesmerized by the geometry of socket joins. Hestia yanked me back by the elbow.
"Eyes forward."
"Sorry—sorry." I tore myself away, but not before noting how the smith had feathered the socket edges to distribute impact stress. Genius.
The demonstration hall lay beyond an iron curtain that parted under a pulley's clank. Compared to the forge, it was hushed, the only sound a steady hiss of quench‑oil and the measured breath of bellows. At its heart stood a towering woman in soot‑streaked smith leathers, crimson hair drawn into a high tail that matched the band over the eyepatch she wore. Her single visible eye blazed like a garnet when she looked up.
"Hestia." The greeting carried the warmth of banked coals. "You brought your mystery Amazon."
Hestia released my arm, stepping forward with familiar ease. "Hephaestus, this is Amara. Amara—Goddess Hephaestus."
Meeting her gaze felt like bracing a completed blade against the whetstone: friction, heat, but purposeful. I dipped into a respectful bow. "An honor, Lady Hephaestus."
"Mm." She wiped a fleck of slag from her cheek with the back of a gloved hand. "Hestia claims you dragged a new ore into my city. Machalite, was it?" She gestured to a nearby anvil, where a turquoise‑flecked dagger blank cooled.
I swallowed, half nerves, half excitement. "Yes, ma'am. Found on the first and second floor walls, mixed with iron seams."
Her eyebrow rose. "First floors, and turquoise? The Dungeon never stops its little jokes." She tossed me the blade blank—still warm, yet already springy. "Feel the grain."
I caught it carefully. Even unfinished, the balance felt…. good. "It's lighter than steel," I murmured, twisting my wrist to examine the edge geometry, "but not brittle. And the heat tint—"
"Stays teal clear through," Hephaestus finished, satisfaction rumbling in her voice. "No phase discoloration even at quench. We've tested one sample; still need more." Her gaze pinned me. "You have more." It wasn't a question.
I wetted my lips. "Some. Not much yet. But I can locate veins when I mine."
The dagger blank was still warm enough to prickle my fingertips, but it had sprung tight the instant it left Hephaestus' tongs, no dull give, only a lively, eager flex along the spine. I let it rest across my palms, angling it toward one of the overhead skylights. Sun‑shafts caught on turquoise inclusions that ran the length of the billet like tiny river veins; where ordinary steels would rainbow as they cooled, this metal kept the same sea‑green sheen no matter how I rocked it.
A smith in battered goggles hovered behind the goddess, clearly dying to snatch the piece back. Hephaestus waved him off with a single gloved finger and nodded for me to continue.
"Grain's tight," I murmured, fingers walking the edge as if reading braille. "No slag seams, even at the weld. Whatever impurities do sit in the lattice are stable—they don't knife the structure apart when you quench." Gemma's memories fluttered up: full‑immersion quench in low‑ash hardwood oil, seventy‑count hammer sequence, polish with bone‑ash pumice— I pushed them down before my mouth could run away.
Hephaestus' eye glimmered. "Not many level‑one adventurers know to look for slag lines at a glance. Where'd you pick that habit up?"
"My… teacher." True enough, Gemma had been forging since she was little. " Feels like it wants a ripple temper—lots of spring, minimal chipping."
The goddess' lips curved, half satisfied, half intrigued. "You felt all that in one pass?"
"Yeah," I said before thinking, then flushed. "Apologies, sounds mad, I know. Metal sings different notes when it's happy or about to crack. Machalite hums in the wrist."
A hushed murmur rippled through the apprentices crowding the doorway. Hephaestus chuckled, low and pleased. "Metal that sings. Nice phrasing." Then her gaze sharpened. "You said 'first and second‑floor seams'. Any sign of deeper deposits?"
"Not Sure as I haven't gone that far down yet." I reached into my satchel. A velvet pouch emerged, cinched with simple twine. "Found something else, though you might like it."
I tipped the contents into my palm. Three faceted crystals, each the size of my fist, tumbled out in muted amber light, clear where they caught the forge fires, smoky where inner fault lines refracted the glow.
Hephaestus inhaled, actually inhaled, like she'd just scented rare perfume. "Not quartz."
"Denser," I agreed. "Splits along trigonal planes if you bully it, but if you cut with the grain, it'll take a polish like moon‑glass. I call it 'earth crystal' for lack of a better term. Hard, easily nine on a Mohs scratch scale, yet not brittle. Heats slowly, refuses to slag unless you exceed white‑iron temps. Once fused into molten steel, it settles into micro‑lattices that deflect sheer force." I caught myself babbling and cleared my throat. "In theory."
Silence swept the hall. Then the smith in goggles blurted, "A ceramic dispersion in a ferrous matrix? Lady Hephaestus, that could push torsion limits past adamantite!"
Hephaestus' mouth twitched, equal parts pride in her child and competitive fire. She extended her hand. " May I?"
I let the crystals slide into her palm. They pinged together like glass chimes yet left no scratch on each other. The goddess lifted one to her eye and rolled it under the light.
"Weight‑to‑volume says you're right, denser than corundum. If it welds half as well as you claim, we're looking at shock‑resistant edge cores, maybe even anti‑magic inlay if it scatters mana flux." She handed them to the goggled smith. "Document everything. Double array tests, thermal, arcane, impact." Her single eye cut back to me, hot as a coke hearth. "How much can you supply?"
I lifted a shoulder. "As much as the Dungeon will let me dig before it notices. The seams respawn after delves, but I won't pretend I've mapped them."
"Map them," she said simply. "Bring me a half‑satchel of Machalite and whatever crystals you can pry free, I'll pay for them or we can work to remove Hestia's debt."
Behind her, apprentices tried—and failed—to keep their jaws from dropping. Hephaestus negotiating with a level‑one? Unheard of. Hestia's grin stretched ear to ear.
Sounds good to me. We can split it, so half goes to paying off that debt."
Hestia exhaled a breath she'd been holding. "Look at you two—already talking in hammer strokes. Big Sis, try not to steal my Amazon, okay?"
Hephaestus smirked. "Borrowing isn't stealing. Besides, you benefit first." She released my arm and gestured toward a side corridor. "Brynn will set you up with loaner leathers and goggles. We start with a Machalite bar stock test. If it forges clean, we upgrade."