I learned that the elves had a priestess who played a similar role to priests among humans. Like Myria’s Oracle, the priestess’s Gift of Invocation allowed her to bless others.
Thanks to that, the elves had begun receiving Gifts too. Of the 238 elves living here, about 20 had received a Gift.
Counting the unblessed children, about one in ten had Gifts, which was roughly the same ratio as us humans. The elves were predisposed to Gifts like Bow Proficiency and White Magic.
White Magic covered light and life-based spells like illumination magic, purification magic, and recovery magic.
Philia was a rare Twice Gifted, like Seren. She had both Bow Proficiency and Green Magic, which was magic involving wind and weather.
Meanwhile, the dwarves didn’t have any sort of priest or priestess, so none of them had Gifts.
“I wonder if Oracle would work on dwarves?” I wondered.
“Well, let’s give it a try.”
Myria attempted to bless the dwarves using Oracle.
“It appears to have succeeded,” she said. “I’ve bestowed Gifts upon ten of them.”
Next, the elven priestess successfully used Invocation on the remaining dwarves, which worked too. It turned out neither type of Blessing was restricted to the Gifted’s own race.
It was admittedly a small sample size, but it seemed that the common Gifts among dwarves were Blacksmithing, Mining, and Yellow Magic, which involved earth and stone-type spells. There was definitely a pattern there.
One of the dwarves in particular stood out.
Dona
Age: 11
Village Affinity: Low
Suggested Job: Artisan
Gift: (Weaponsmith)
That sounded pretty intense for a kid. She’d just turned eleven, so she hadn’t received her Gift yet.
Unlike most of the dwarves, who rarely left the tunnels, Dona often emerged to wander around the village and marvel at the buildings. She seemed like a naturally inquisitive kid.
When I mass-produced weapons with Facility Customization, she’d always turn up and watch. She never said anything. She just quietly sat there and watched me work, totally absorbed. She seemed pretty shy.
“You like weapons?” I asked her one day while working.
Dwarves were quite rugged. The men were stout and broad, and the women were on the rounder side, but the kids didn’t look much different from human children. Well, they might look a bit younger comparatively. Their lifespans weren’t as long as elves, but they still outlived humans, which meant they had longer childhoods.
She nodded silently, then hesitantly revealed something she’d been hiding behind her back.
“Is that a stone tablet? It looks old,” I said, studying the weathered slab. It was covered in some kind of writing. “I can’t read it. Is it some ancient language? Can you read it, Dona?”
She shook her head. “It came from the cave. It’s always been there. It’s probably from the ancient dwarves.”
“Ancient dwarves? Oh, you mean like your ancestors?”
“Look.” She pointed to a drawing in the corner of the tablet. It depicted a humanoid figure with strange proportions. It had a big head, short legs, long arms, and a stout, round torso.
“What is it?” I wondered. “A golem, maybe?”
“Weapon.”
“A weapon?” I repeated.
“Yep. An ancient, dwarven weapon. It’s not a golem. You go inside. Here.”
I looked closer and noticed a porthole in the center of the figure’s head. And sure enough, I saw a little face inside.
“So a person controls the weapon from within?”
I wondered if that had been what Philia was referring to when she mentioned the dwarves using powerful weapons to conquer the world. If the thing were piloted, it probably relied on some ancient tech now lost to time.
There was no way we could build one of those now.
“Hm, but maybe I can build something similar,” I said, an idea hitting me.
I summoned a stone wall. Dona’s eyes widened, but I ignored her and started customizing it.
“All right, first I’ll stretch it out vertically.”
I shaped it, using the image from the tablet as a template, and added arms, legs, and a head.
“Whoa!” Dona gasped, staring in amazement at the stone golem that just appeared. It was a perfect copy of the figure on the tablet.
“It can move too. Watch.”
I used Facility Customization again, this time to make the limbs move.
Okay, getting the balance right is trickier than I expected.
“It moved!”
“Yep, but this is where things get interesting.”
I made the golem crouch and extend an arm toward the ground.
“See? Now you can climb onto it,” I said.
“Wow!”
I grabbed Dona’s hand, and her eyes lit up with excitement. I led her up the simple staircase that I’d built into the golem’s arm. Once we reached the head, I turned toward her. “Take a look. You can actually go inside.”
There was an entrance built in the side of its head where we could climb directly into the cockpit. Right now, it was just a hollow space, so I carved out a front-facing window for visibility and added a basic seat.
“All right, let’s take it for a stroll through the village.”
“Okay!”
I activated the stone golem and started moving it forward.
Whud. Whud. Whud.
The vibrations were way stronger than I expected inside, and controlling it was also much more difficult than it looked. Every time the golem moved, Dona’s tiny body bounced up and down in the seat. Still, she looked totally thrilled.
“Whee! This is amazing! It moves, it really moves! This is awesome!” Her earlier silence vanished as she cheered with bright, shining eyes.
Naturally, a gigantic walking golem had attracted attention. Before long, a crowd of villagers had gathered.
“Whoa, what the hell is that?!”
“A golem? Why is there a golem here?!”
“Wait—is there someone inside it?!”