It had taken two months.Two months of sweat and setbacks, of calloused hands and sleepless nights. Weather delays had turned the site into a quagmire, with late autumn rains swelling the river until it threatened to drown the scaffolding. Misaligned gears had snapped under strain, spitting shards of iron into the mud. Cracked beams had forced entire sections to be rebuilt, and an unexpected flood runoff from the northern peaks had nearly washed out the southern trench, leaving workers scrambling to shore up the banks with stone and timber. They had fought the land, the frost, and sometimes even themselves—arguments flaring over angles, materials, and the stubborn will of a river that refused to bend.But today, Emberhold would witness a turning point.The morning sun broke low over the ridge, its pale light cutting through the mist that clung to the stones like a shroud. The air was sharp with the scent of wet earth and pine, laced with the faint tang of charcoal from the forges below. There, standing like a beast chained to the riverbank, was the first of its kind—the Dominion's water-powered hammer, a monument of oak, iron, and relentless ambition.The wheel spun slowly, its slats glistening with spray, fed by the mountain stream they had diverted through a stone-lined channel. The water churned, white and silver, catching the dawn's glow as it drove the mechanism. Every few seconds, the arm creaked upward, its iron hammerhead—broad as a man's chest—rising into the air with a groan of wood and metal. Then the notched axle turned, the catch released, and the hammer fell.Boom.The strike shook the anvil stone, a slab of granite quarried from the southern ridge, its surface already scarred from test blows. The sound was not of war, but of transformation—a deep, resonant note that echoed across the valley, steady as a heartbeat.Alexander stood on the scaffold beside the platform, his cloak drawn tight against the mountain wind that tugged at its edges. The wool was heavy with dew, flecked with sawdust and coal ash, and his boots were caked with the red clay that clung to everything in the worksite. His eyes, sharp and unyielding, followed the hammer's arc, tracing every motion—the wheel's turn, the arm's rise, the catch's click. Below him, blacksmiths, engineers, and apprentices had gathered in cautious formation, their faces a mix of awe and skepticism. Their tunics were stained with sweat and soot, their hands wrapped in leather to guard against splinters and burns. Eyes wide, breaths held, they stood in the shadow of the machine, its rhythm drowning out the morning's quiet.Silas stood at his right, scribbling quickly in a narrow ledger, the parchment already smudged with ink and clay. His spectacles glinted in the sunlight, slipping slightly as he tilted his head to watch the mechanism. "Clean arc," he muttered, his quill scratching. "The release works—smooth, no stutter. Timing's near perfect.""Almost poetic," Elias murmured beside him, arms crossed, his dark cloak fluttering in the breeze. His voice carried a rare note of wonder, his eyes tracing the hammer's path as if it were a living thing. "Like watching a giant breathe, in and out, steady as stone."Gareth snorted, his broad frame leaning against the scaffold's railing, his blacksmith's hands resting on the wood. "If giants dropped iron on your head every breath." His grin was half-hidden beneath his beard, but his eyes were bright with approval, catching the glint of the hammer's polished head.Lord Voss, still dressed in travel clothes from an early inspection of the northern warehouses, squinted at the wheel's motion, his gloved hands clasped behind his back. His cloak was finer than the others', edged with gray fur, but it was dusted with the same clay that marked them all. "It's… reliable," he said, his voice measured, almost reluctant. "You can see it. Feel it. Every strike the same as the last."Alexander said nothing at first. He simply watched, his breath visible in the chill air, his hands steady on the scaffold's edge.Boom.The hammer rose and fell again, the anvil stone trembling faintly, a thin crack already spiderwebbing across its surface from the force. The crowd below shifted, a murmur rippling through them—part excitement, part disbelief.Owen stepped up from the lower tier of the site, his tunic soaked with morning dew and sawdust, his boots leaving muddy prints on the scaffold's planks. His face was flushed from the climb, his hair matted with sweat, but his voice was steady. "Load-bearing frame held through the night," he said, glancing toward the counterweights, heavy slabs of iron suspended by braided ropes. "The iron teeth in the gearshift caught every cycle. We've run it seven times without pause—full weight, full speed.""Material strain?" Alexander asked, his eyes still on the hammer, catching the faint gleam of the axle's pins as they turned."Minimal," Owen said, wiping his brow with a rag that left a smear of dirt. "We used the new tempered pins, quenched in oil like you said. The hammer arm will last a season before needing replacements—maybe two if we grease the joints regularly. The wheel could last three if maintained, though the slats'll need checking for rot come spring."Gareth nodded, his grin widening. "She's not just functional. She's a marvel—a damned beast of a machine." His voice carried the pride of a man who'd spent his life shaping steel, now seeing it shaped by something greater."It's just the beginning," Alexander said, his voice low but firm, cutting through the creak of the wheel and the murmur of the crowd.And then it struck.A shift—not in the forge, but in him. A pulse, a flicker of certainty, like a spark catching dry tinder. Not magic, not thought, but something deeper, as if the land, the labor, and the effort had finally answered his call, resonating with the rhythm of the hammer itself.And with it, came the message, silent and unseen, settling into his mind like a stone into still water:Path of the Innovator – Level 2 Unlocked
Title: Engineering Specialist
✔ Innovative development speed +25%
✔ Material usage efficiency +30%
✔ Construction speed +40%
✔ Early logistics planning improves, reducing delivery delays by 30%He exhaled slowly, his breath clouding in the cold, his eyes still fixed on the hammer as it rose again. The world hadn't changed—the wheel still turned, the river still roared, the crowd still watched—but he had.The hammer hadn't just marked a breakthrough in engineering. It had crossed a threshold—one few would ever see, one he alone could feel. He was no longer just a tactician, a builder of walls and ideas. He had become something else.A force.He turned to the others, his voice steady, commanding. "I want three more. One by the quarry, one by the southern ridge, and one at the high forge behind the smithing district."Gareth blinked, his grin faltering for a moment. "Three?" The word carried both surprise and respect, his hands already twitching as if mapping out the work."We'll use the same design," Alexander said, his gaze sweeping the group, anchoring them. "Adjust terrain plans where needed—elevation, water flow, foundation depth. We start replication now, before winter locks the rivers."Owen rubbed the back of his neck, already thinking through the labor logistics, his brow furrowing. "I'll need more builders—twenty, maybe thirty. More rivets, too, and reinforced timbers. The quarry's oak stock is low after the last haul.""We'll have them," Alexander said, his tone leaving no room for doubt. "The council just approved expanded material quotas last week. Silas, reroute the next timber shipment from the eastern groves. Owen, pull your best masons from the wall repairs—they'll be back before the frost sets."Silas nodded, his quill scratching again, numbers and names flowing onto the ledger. "I'll have the orders drafted by noon."Lord Voss stepped forward, his brow furrowed, his eyes flicking from the hammer to Alexander. "Do you realize what this means, politically?" His voice was low, urgent, the fur on his cloak stirring in the breeze.Alexander turned to him, his expression calm but expectant. "Go on.""If word of this spreads," Voss said, gesturing to the machine, "the merchant guilds will panic. No one in the Kingdom has this—not Varenia, not the coastal cities, not even the royal forges. It's not just innovation—it's independence. You're replacing entire teams of laborers with flowing water and one operator. A single machine doing the work of ten men, with no coal, no rest, no wages."Elias leaned forward, a faint smirk tugging at his lips. "And we're not importing a thing—not steel, not parts, not even the damned nails. It's all ours, built from the ground up." His voice carried a rare edge of pride, his hand gesturing to the valley below, where Emberhold's forges smoked and its walls gleamed."They'll think we're hoarding secrets," Silas muttered, his quill pausing, his eyes narrowing behind his spectacles. "And they'll be right. The guilds already whisper about our Tenebrium surplus. This'll turn whispers into demands."Alexander let a faint smile touch his lips, sharp and fleeting. "Then let them wonder. We don't need to advertise our strength—just build it. Let the guilds squabble over rumors while we work."Silas set his quill down, his hands folding over the ledger, his voice soft but heavy. "You're not just building infrastructure, Alexander. You're laying the bones of something far bigger—a system that could outlast us all."Alexander looked out over the valley, where the hammer fell again, its boom reverberating through the stones, steady as a drumbeat. The mist was burning away now, revealing the sprawl of Emberhold below—rooftops of slate and timber, streets winding like rivers, forges glowing like stars against the dawn. The city was alive, its pulse matched by the machine before him."We built this city with hands and fire," he said, his voice low but resonant, carrying over the creak of the wheel. "Now we'll refine it with precision—every strike, every stone, every plan."The sky brightened further, casting gold over the rooftops, catching the steam rising from the forges and the glint of the river as it churned. Below, a group of apprentices broke into quiet cheers as another round of test strikes landed perfectly, the hammer's rhythm unbroken. Even the older smiths, hardened and skeptical, had begun nodding among themselves, their arms crossed but their eyes alight with something new—hope, perhaps, or the flicker of a future they hadn't dared imagine.Alexander watched them, pride quiet in his chest, a warmth that countered the morning's chill. For the first time, they weren't just surviving in the wasteland, clawing at ash and stone for scraps of life.They were mastering it, bending the land to their will, forging a legacy that would echo beyond their years.And in the distance, the hammer struck again, its sound a promise—a new rhythm for a new age.