The courtyard of Blackcrag Keep had been transformed into a construction site.
Under Dante's relentless supervision, the stables had been torn down. The wood was piled high, ready to be turned into charcoal. The iron hinges, horseshoes, and nails—along with the shattered remains of Ser Garret's sword—were piled next to the stone hearth in the Great Hall.
Dante stood over a makeshift table, sketching on a piece of rough parchment with a piece of charcoal.
"Kaelen," Dante called out without looking up. "The sulfur. Did you find it?"
Kaelen hurried over, holding a bucket filled with yellow, powdery rocks. He looked exhausted, his face streaked with soot.
"We found it near the hot springs in the lower ravine, my Lord. It smells... foul. Like rotten eggs and demons."
"It smells like victory," Dante corrected. He took a pinch of the yellow powder and rubbed it between his fingers.
[Item: Raw Sulfur][Purity: 70%. Needs refinement.]
"Grind it," Dante ordered. "Keep it separate from the charcoal. If you mix them near a flame before I tell you, we all die. Understand?"
Kaelen gulped and nodded, rushing off to the grinding station.
Dante turned his attention to the second figure in the room.
It was a young woman, perhaps twenty, with messy red hair and dirt-smudged cheeks. She was one of the survivors, the daughter of the blacksmith who had died last winter. Her name was Elara.
She was currently holding a heavy hammer, staring at the strange clay mold Dante had forced her to build.
"My Lord," Elara said, her voice skeptical. "You want me to melt down all our iron... for a tube? A hollow pipe?"
"Not just a pipe, Elara. A barrel."
"It's a waste of metal!" she argued, showing a spark of defiance that Dante actually appreciated. "We need spear tips. We need arrowheads. If Baron Voss comes, a metal stick won't stop him."
Dante walked over to her. He picked up the clay mold.
"Elara, do you know why a spear kills?"
"Because it's sharp," she frowned.
"Because it transfers kinetic energy," Dante corrected. "A man can throw a spear at maybe 30 meters per second. That's enough to pierce leather. Maybe weak chainmail."
He tapped the mold for the rifle barrel.
"This device will launch a projectile at 400 meters per second. It doesn't need to be sharp. At that speed, even a pebble hits with the force of a falling boulder."
Elara looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language. "400 meters... in a second? That's impossible. Not even a Wind Mage is that fast."
Dante smiled, a sharp, dangerous curve of his lips. "That is why they will lose. They are limited by their imagination. I harness the unbending laws of reality."
He pointed to the roaring fire where the "useless" coal was burning hotter than any wood fire Elara had ever seen.
"Melt the iron," Dante commanded. "Purity matters. I want the slag skimmed off three times. If there is a single air bubble in the casting, the barrel will explode in my face."
Elara hesitated, then looked at the intense heat radiating from the coal fire. She had never seen iron melt so fast. This man... he was terrifying, but he made things happen.
She nodded and picked up the tongs. "Yes, my Lord."
Two Days Later. (Day 2 of 3)
The Keep was alive with noise. The ringing of hammers, the grinding of pestles, and the roar of the blast furnace.
Dante hadn't slept. His eyes were red-rimmed, his body running on adrenaline and the tiny trickle of mana provided by the System.
On the table before him lay the parts.
A smooth, bored-out iron barrel, reinforced with steel bands. A wooden stock, carved from seasoned oak. A simple serpentine lever mechanism (the trigger). And a pile of lead balls, cast from old fishing weights.
[Blueprint: Matchlock Arquebus][Assembly Progress: 95%]
Dante's hands moved with practiced speed. He fitted the barrel into the stock. He screwed the lock mechanism into place. He checked the tension on the trigger spring.
Click. Click.
The action was rough, but functional.
"It's ugly," Dante muttered, sighting down the barrel. "But it will work."
He turned to his 'Chemical Team'—Kaelen and two others. They were mixing the three powders (Charcoal, Sulfur, Saltpeter) in a wooden bowl, using a ratio Dante had scratched into the table: 75:15:10.
"The Black Sand is ready, Lord," Kaelen whispered, treating the mixture with terrifying reverence.
"Granulate it," Dante said. "Wet it slightly with urine—don't look at me like that, the ammonia helps—then push it through a sieve to make grains. It burns faster."
By the time the sun began to set on the second day, it was done.
Dante stood in the courtyard. The snow had stopped falling.
Kaelen, Elara, and the other survivors gathered around him. They looked at the strange weapon in his hands. It looked like a club with a metal pipe on top.
"Elara," Dante said. "Bring me the breastplate from Ser Garret's broken armor."
Elara fetched the piece of armor. It was dented and rusted, but it was still solid iron—enough to stop any arrow.
"Prop it up against the wall," Dante ordered. "Fifty paces."
Elara did as she was told, then ran back to safety.
Dante poured a measure of the black grains down the muzzle. He dropped a lead ball in. He used a wooden rod to ram it all down tight.
He poured a tiny amount of powder into the flash pan.
He lit a slow-match cord from a torch and clipped it into the serpentine lever.
"Cover your ears," Dante warned.
The peasants covered their ears, watching with wide eyes.
Dante raised the weapon. The heavy stock pressed against his shoulder. He aimed at the breastplate.
He took a breath. [Target Locked.]
He pulled the trigger.
The burning cord lowered into the pan.
Hiss—
CRACK!
A flash of white smoke blinded them, accompanied by a sound so loud it felt like a slap to the chest.
Through the smoke, they heard a metallic CLANG.
Dante lowered the smoking gun. "Check it."
Elara ran to the breastplate. She stopped dead in her tracks.
"My Lord..." she gasped.
She held up the armor.
There was a clean, jagged hole punched right through the center of the iron plate. The lead ball had smashed through the front and blown out the back, tearing the metal like paper.
The peasants gasped. They looked at the hole, then at the smoking tube in Dante's hands.
"That's... that's iron," Kaelen stuttered. "A heavy crossbow at close range might dent it. But to punch through?"
Dante blew the smoke away from the lock mechanism.
"This is an Arquebus," Dante announced to his silent audience. "It requires no mana. It requires no years of training. A peasant with this weapon can kill a Knight who has trained for twenty years."
He looked at their faces. He saw the fear, but he also saw something else.
Hope.
"Baron Voss is coming tomorrow," Dante said, his voice ringing in the cold air. "He expects sheep. He's going to find wolves."
[System Alert][Crafting Complete: Matchlock Arquebus (Poor Quality)][Experience Gained: 500 XP][Level Up!][New Blueprint Unlocked: Fragmentation Grenade.]
Dante smiled. "Elara, get the molds ready. We're working all night. I want ten of these by sunrise."