The Scrap Tamer - Chapter 174

Chapter 174: The World Below
“Elarion is…was a world of peace,” Garrick started “it’s a world not unlike this one but at the same time, a world different from this one.”

Garrick leaned forward as he recalled the details of his world, “Unlike earth, Humans were not the only dominant species on Elarion.”

If Reid hadn’t been fully paying attention before, he certainly was now.

“Elarion is separated Into four kingdoms,” Garrick continued “the human kingdom, the elven kingdom, the beasts kingdom and finally, the dwarven kingdom…my homeland.”

His sadness was clear in his voice, and the look on his face made it even more obvious.

Reid was definitely surprised—Elarion sounded like one of those fantasy worlds straight out of novels, anime, or the games he’d grown up with. And now, sitting right in front of him, was living proof, a literal dwarf.

But instead of interrupting, he stayed quiet, letting the old man continue.

“The four kingdoms weren’t always allies,” Garrick said, voice lower now, like the weight of the memories was pressing down on him.

“Wars broke out—old grudges, pride, the usual. But eventually, we found balance. Trade routes opened. Knowledge was shared. We even had a council, one with representatives from each kingdom”

“For years, this balance was maintained,” Garrick went on, his gaze distant. “Was it perfect, no… but it was something worth fighting to protect.”

He paused for a moment, his jaw tightening “And that’s when they arrived, Chaos beasts.”

“Chaos beasts?” Reid asked.

“Yes, beasts born from Chaos itself” Garrick looked at him and nodded “the very beasts you humans refer to as primals.”

“They came without warning,” He continued. “One day, the skies above the Beast Kingdom cracked open and out came those horrors.”

“But Elarion wasn’t a stranger to rifts and just like always, we just classified it as a slightly bigger rift…. nothing we hadn’t dealt with before.”

Garrick let his words settle before continuing “and for the first few years, we were holding our own against these monsters, no, we were even winning.”

The old man’s pause informed Reid that there was a “but” coming and he was right.

“But that’s when they descended,” there was a visible tremble on Garrick’s clenched fist, whether from anger or fear was unknown, “they called themselves children of Chaos and their presence immediately turned the tides of the war.”

The mention of children of Chaos immediately reminded Reid of a single name, Malrath.

‘So the world below they were talking about was Master Garrick’s’ he mentally figured.

“They were beings of unimaginable power,” Garrick said, his voice barely above a whisper now. “Each looked completely different from the other. Some looked like us—humanoid, intelligent, even charismatic while others were walking nightmares.”

“But regardless of how they looked, one thing was for certain, the seven children of Chaos were not just strong.”

“They were strong enough to break the concepts, laws, even the very fabric of our world. Even magic stopped working around them. Our strongest warriors and mages fell like flies.”

“But worst of all, any of our mages, knights or warriors killed by one of the siblings known as Malrath… didn’t stay dead.”

Reid raised a brow in confusion but the old man’s next words clarified his confusion.

“They rose again,” Garrick muttered, “but this time, not as one of our own but as a puppet bonded to Malrath.”

This just confirmed to Reid that the world below was the same Master Garrick was speaking of.

But unlike the Malrath described in the old man’s story, it seems that shard that was summoned to the city did not have the ability to raise the soldiers that died by its sword as one of its own.

“From the moment they arrived, one thing was clear,” Garrick took another pause, this time a longer one “…our world was lost”.

“In just a week, the beast and elven kingdoms had fallen” His voice trembled as he continued “and it only took that long because the seven were only interested in our struggles.”

Reid’s brows furrowed. “So how did you get here? To Earth?”

Garrick let out a breath, “That… that part I still don’t fully understand. My kin and I were among the last defenders of Stonewake, the Dwarven capital.”

“And the next thing I knew, I was falling through one of the rifts,” Garrick said, his voice distant, like he was reliving the moment. “One second I was standing atop the last bastion wall, fighting beside my brothers… the next, the space in front of us tore open and in attempt to save them, I was pulled in.”

He paused, lightly rubbing his temple.

“I thought I was dead. Or worse… sent to the place where those things came from.”

Reid leaned forward, curious “but you somehow ended up here.”

“Yes,” Garrick nodded “when I woke up next, I was here, on Earth with the fates of my kingdom and world unknown.”

There was silence in the forge lab as Reid quietly absorbed the old man’s story. He wanted to say something, maybe something comforting but he didn’t know where to start so he just remained silent.

“Hey, I didn’t tell you my story just for you to have pity on me,” Garrick’s grumpy attitude returned as he looked at the expression on Reid’s face.

He turned to the sword Reid had placed back on the table and picked it up.

“The reason I told you this was because of the type of runes I engraved on this sword,” Garrick said.

“You see, the dwarven kingdom was known for its use of runes in blacksmithing.” He sounded proud of their art, “and that was the reason why no other kingdom was able to suppress us during our times of war.”

“I see,” Reid muttered.

Garrick’s reaction to Reid showing him the evolution runes made a lot more sense now.

“In our times of peace, my people learnt to create weapons for magic knights of the human kingdom,” he held the sword towards Reid, “a technique which I used to create this sword.”

Reid still didn’t get why the old man stated that he shouldn’t have been able to use the sword.

“And the magic knights of Elarion had something called ‘magic cores’ ” Garrick raised a suspicious brow towards “my goal was to work backwards and allow it to work with soul power, but nothing I do seemed to work.”

Reid finally understood where the old man was going.

“So tell me, my dear apprentice” Garrick locked eyes with him, “how did you get a magic core?”

Reid had two options in this situation, tell the old man the truth or lie his way out.

Normally, Reid wouldn’t hesitate to go for the the latter but this time was different. This time, his master had put enough trust in him and shared something that he assumed should’ve been a military secret.

Raised his head to meet his master’s stare, Reid let out a sigh and started, “I got it during the previous mission we were sent on.”

Reid went on to explain what went on during the mission, to the point where he let the Mother Voidspawn try taking over his body.

Of course, he left out the part where he met the watcher or anything about the system or his future self….which he hadn’t gotten the chance to converse with yet.

He left that part out not because of trust or anything like that, Reid just didn’t want his master in danger due to having information on Evo.

After all, the cult already knew that Reid had the evolution Codex and they would stop at nothing to get him under their control.

“I see” Garrick nodded after listening to Reid’s own story, “so unlike my world’s magic knights and mages, your core was formed by one of those primals, almost like with your mother and her forged beast?”

“Yeah,” Reid said, “but unlike Mom’s awakening, my body seemed to have forced the primal into a core.”

“Hmm,” Garrick took on a thinking pose, his hands caressing his beard before he concluded, “that makes this easier then.”

“Huh?” Reid let out in confusion.

“I mean, the sword was supposed to be a weapon for you,” he said as he gestured for Reid to take it from him “along with a couple other equipments.”

Reid wanted to say something but the old man quickly interrupted, “don’t get the wrong idea, no apprentice of mine would be allowed to walk around with mediocre equipments.”

‘I see’ Reid mentally muttered, ‘another tsundere.’

As if sensing his thoughts, the old man glared at him but Reid put on an innocent face.

Garrick then hopped off where he sat and walked towards something that looked like a storage unit or maybe a safe?

Tapping a couple of buttons, the door to the safe opened, revealing a couple of materials within.

Garrick picked up a something that looked like a fabric before closing the safe back up.

“Try this on,” he tossed the fabric to Reid, ” since you have a core, it should work.”

Reid caught the material and the feeling of it trying to drain his void core returned.

But unlike the sword, the material succeeded in draining a bit of void energy from his core.

“Thanks?” Reid said before immediately asking “so how do I put it on?”

“Try thinking of the type of clothes you want to wear, down to the boots” Garrick replied.

Following the old man’s instructions, Reid thought of the type of clothes he’d like to wear and for a couple of seconds, nothing happened.

But that’s when the material started shifting, like the Voidspawns, it slowly crawled up Reid’s arms and attached itself to the overalls he wore.

The overalls started shifting into black comfortable upper armor, pants, boots, gloves and finally, a black long coat.

“Not bad,” Reid muttered, flexing his fingers as the gloves adjusted to his movements.

“It’s called Adaptive Nullweave,” Garrick said, watching him carefully. “Originally made to absorb excess magic radiation, but I tweaked it. Now, you can transform it into whatever you want to wear.”

“That’s really cool,” Reid said again before bowing, “thank you master.”

Garrick just waved his hand in dismissal before saying, “there’s also this.”

He tapped his military issued watch a couple of times and a second later, a ding sounded from Reid’s.

Bringing the watch to eyes level, Reid’s eyes widened as he stuttered out, “Th-this much?”