Chapter 24 - The Iron City

Our first destination was to the Iron City itself. It had no name, but took on the nickname of the ‘Iron Fortress’, famed for being impenetrable. I had no idea just how true the rumors were when we approached the cold, snowy mountains it was situated in. In the very northern part of the world.

The whole city was full of towers, armed to the teeth by turrets that no doubt shot cannons or worse, any ship that tried to illegally enter would be mowed down. Torn to shreds, without mercy.

The windows glowed a bright orange as smoke rose from almost every window imaginable, no doubt from countless factories making all sorts of tools and gadgets.

Elowyn lowered us down a short distance away from the city gates, the turrets seemed to perk up a bit. I imagined if we didn’t, we would know for sure just what was in those turrets.

When we landed, it somehow got even more cold. My outfit kept me decently warm, but Elowyn and Grace looked like they were freezing. They hugged themselves and stayed close, shaking on occasion.

“Well, sooner we get inside, the sooner we can get warm.” I urged them to get going.

Elowyn nodded. “Of course, let me in, I’m so cold.” Her tone is more of a whine if anything.

Grace however seemed to be fascinated, sure she was cold. Then I realized she had never seen snow before. “Snow, real snow.” She murmured in wonder, she started to look more like a child on the first snow of winter.

“You said people in your world make all sorts of things out of snow?” Grace asked, a bit curious.

“Yeah,” I mentioned when we began our walk. “We would make snowmen, maybe even snow forts, the local kids and I would pretend to be Samurai, marching off to war, and the snowballs were our weapons.” I felt nostalgic, even though it felt so long ago.

“That sounds like fun, hey Razan, if we ever get the time. We should try making a snowman together.” Grace offered, I felt a flush of heat rise up to my face.

“Sure, we’ll do that on the way out. You should join us too, Elowyn. You could use a bit of fun.” I looked at her, awaiting her response.

“Yeah, count me out. I’ve only been on the ground for a few minutes and I’m already sick of the cold.” She grumbled, the poor thing looked like she was about to turn into a popsicle.

“Suppose the cold is your weakness then.” I took note of that, smiling all the while, Elowyn gave me a nice glare.

Finally, we approached a large steel gate. It looked to be the size of a skyscraper, and as wide as a city street. In front of it stood three dwarves, they were small as expected, but round. They wore heavy armor, and carried battleaxes as tall as me.

They looked very mean, and the busy beards they had did not help that image in any way.

“Excuse me, we would like passage into your city, is that fine?” I asked the guardsmen. I wanted to ask them what was with the big gate, but something tells me that wouldn’t fly very well.

“Identification.” The middle of the three guardsmen requested.

Elowyn stepped before us. “I’m Elowyn Arclaneia, current heir and Queen of the Elves.” Even if she wasn’t officially crowned.

“My condolences, Lady Elowyn.” The guard spoke in surprise, probably not expecting to see her with us. “We’ll let you three in, and inform the President. However there must be a pat down, dangerous times these days.” The Dwarves walked up to us, and patted us down before Elowyn could say a word.

I didn’t particularly care too much, however one of them noticed the mark on my cheek. “You will come with us. Our boss wants a few words with you.”

Elowyn nodded, indicating it would be ok, and so I reluctantly obliged. I was on the inside, but I didn’t get to see what was beyond the gates outside of more towers, and the occasional house. I instead was taken away from the group and into a dim dank hallway.

Finally, I was thrown into a cell. Wait, a cell?

“Hold on a minute! What’s going on?!” I got up after being thrown to the ground, I ran to the cell bars, grabbing them as the door slammed shut. “Why am I being detained?!”

The guards simply said nothing. “President's orders, all Heroes who show up at our doors are to be detained and executed.”

I was going to get executed? If I didn’t do something, I would die. “Why? Why are heroes getting rounded up like this?”

The guard shrugged. “His orders, not mine. I just follow them.”

I saw my weapons, the guards seemed to be inspecting them. I remembered the training I took. I first decided to inspect the lock, it looked pretty strong. I doubt they would put a high value target in a cheap shoddy cell.

I felt the metal, it looked to be a steel of some kind. I figured with the training I got in Arclaneia, I should be strong enough to break through it if I poured enough energy into my strike.

But not here, too many guards and all their weapons could probably cut me open at the slightest touch. I watched them take my sword and shield away after inspection.

No doubt it would be secured somewhere. Maybe even sold, who knows? Either way, I couldn’t sit here.

Time would pass, hours, finally only one guard remained. Now was my time to strike.

I chopped at the lock, it snapped like a twig. Yet the audible crack of the cell door alerted the guard, I slammed the door open and punched the guard in the head. Checking his vitals revealed he was alive.

“Thank goodness, sorry there. But I got to get to my friends, and maybe check this President guy out.” I’d rather keep killing contestants who want me dead first.

I ran down several winding hallways, tracing the steps I took to get back to how I got in. Every so often I ran into the occasional guard which I instantly knocked out. Finally I got to a hallway that contained a different room. My sword and shield hung up on the wall.

As soon as I walked in however, I was ambushed by a towering figure. Not a dwarf, but a giant. He towered even over me, and the room was built to accommodate him.

“So you’re the guard of this place? I’ll just be taking my weapons and there will be nothing to worry about, yeah?” I negotiated, slowly backing up, right above my head were my own weapons.

The giant said nothing, before in one swift movement, he charged and crashed into me. I jumped out of the way just in time and grabbed my sword and shield. I then landed right on his back, before jumping out of the way.

I looked behind me, the giant had gotten his head out of the wall, he seemed to have left a sizable dent in it. There was zero room to move around in here, and I’m sure the giant knew that as well.

I just needed to weave around him and get to the exit, then I could presumably run free. The problem was I doubt this one was stupid enough to make the same mistake twice.

“It was fun playing with you, but it ends here.” The giant pressed a button against the wall, a red one. It sounded an alarm throughout the entire prison, I had about five minutes at most to get out of here before I was surrounded. “Shame yer gettin’ killed, hopefully you’re not a butcher in your next life.” After these words, I was given a toothy grin from the giant. He seemed genuinely thrilled, whether it was about my impending demise, or the fun he was having from fighting me. I didn’t have time to think.

I needed to act.

I charged forward, if he wouldn’t make the next move, I would. He blocked my strike with my sword. Seems I needed to specialize a bit. “Sword mode!” I called out, my shield vanished and I had just my sword.

I felt my power and speed increase, I’m sure the giant noticed it as well as I could see him grit his teeth.

“You got stronger! You’re fun!” The giant shouted as he put all of his force, pushing me back and sending me flying against the wall. “Agh!” I could hardly move now, almost all of my energy was gone.

It hurt, my whole body hurt.

I heard footsteps, lots of them. No doubt reinforcements had finally arrived, I looked to see the giant move, allowing for a small army of dwarven guards to enter the room. I just had to fight through them.

So naturally I charged through, only this time, I cut through maybe five or six before I took a club to the back of the head. I was slowly but surely losing my consciousness.

I had lost.

I couldn’t escape, this giant was too strong.

I failed. I could only picture Grace and Elowyn in my head, before even their images began to cloud and fade from my mind.

Before long, there was nothing.

To be continued.