"Dinner with the round table, ey?" Thomas chuckled as he doused the flames of the forge. "I’ve been working here for over eighty years and I’ve never seen them."
When he turned around he was met with shocked expressions of the group.
"What, surprised that I’m this old?" The blacksmith laughed. "I was very talented in aura cultivation, it’s the main reason I got so upset they denied my battle trial and knighthood - after that I cultivated purely out of spite."
"What do you mean?" Cassian questioned.
"Once I stopped aging they could no longer pressure me into taking in an apprentice - I would be here for as long as they need me after all. They didn’t allow me to become a knight because they weren’t willing to risk their only blacksmith, so now they’ll have only one blacksmith - forever."
"You didn’t cultivate just out of spite though, right?" Calen stated.
Thomas raised and eyebrow and smiled faintly.
"What makes you say that?"
"You used aura to leave a signature on Albert’s armour - it stands to reason that you’ve found a way to use it during the forging process."
"Very good." The blacksmith nodded in approval. "I created a technique which allows me to imbue armour and weapons with my own aura, allowing even a child to wield that terrifying power."
"That sounds incredible, it would allow the humanity to beat the Blightborn even without the help of sacred flame - which begs the question why such equipment isn’t mass produced?"
Thomas scratched his neck.
"You see, the technique isn’t quite finished. Currently the items produced using it have a tendency to sometimes... explode a bit."
"But I swear on my ancestors that I will perfect this technique, and arm humanity with a new power that will allow us to strike down our oppressors!" Thomas paused. "Unless you do that first I guess."
"Won’t you need to take apprentices to do that?" Isara pointed out. "Even if human population was decimated you can’t arm tens of thousands of people by yourself."
"... I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. Anyway, aren’t you late for your formal dinner?"
Predictably Harold was the person escorting them to the chamber where they would meet the leaders.
"I’m afraid that not everyone from the round table will be attending." He informed them.
"What does that mean exactly? How many of them will be absent?" Calen frowned.
"I don’t know unfortunately, I was only told that some of the round table members suddenly fell ill."
"I thought aura users are immune to all diseases?"
Harold didn’t comment further because they reached their target - a grand door leading to the chamber where the round table normally gathers.
The knight knocked to announce their arrival, and opened the door.
Inside they saw eleven empty seats, and only one person sitting on the opposite side of the room.
"Thank you sir Harold, you can leave them here." The man inside nodded at the knight.
Harold bowed and left, closing the door behind him.
Their host looked to be around the same age as Thomas, but as they learned looks van be deceiving. The man had a short, neatly trimmed beard, short brown hair and almost unnaturally green eyes.
"Let me introduce myself, I am Leon - the second oldest member of the Order, right after sir Nickolas."
"It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir Leon." Calen greeted him. "Could you perhaps tell us what happened to the others...?"
"Just Leon is fine." The knight waved his hand. "As for your question, I poisoned them of course."
His words were followed by a stunned silence - poisoned? How? Why?
Leon didn’t let them to ask any questions before he started explaining on his own.
"To clarify, I didn’t kill or even harm them - the poison did little more than make them sleep and forget all about this little meeting."
"To talk with you without the presence of those power-hungry fools." Leon smiled. "We’re in the current situation because of their foolishness, and I couldn’t let them ruin more things."
"What about Arthur, won’t he be upset about your actions?"
"I couldn’t give less shit about the usurper, and he’s too busy talking to his sword like a psycho anyway."
"Am I correct to assume you want to free sir Nickolas and expose Arthur?"
"Yes, that’s precisely why I wanted to meet with you. I can’t do much on my own without drawing attention of the rest, but I can help you to do it for me - as long as you’re willing of course."
"How come there are so many people sympathetic to Nickolas’ case if he’s supposed to not have any followers?" Elira questioned.
"I was initially one of his biggest opponents - but I wanted to size the power legitimately, not by using cheap tricks, cheating and scheming."
"So you want to free him just to take the power away from him?"
"Taking over is no longer my goal, not after seeing how those idiots fucked up everything. Now I just want to go back to how it was before, but since that is impossible I want to expose the rest of the round table for their actions and hopefully exile them."
"Aren’t you afraid that you’ll get exiled as well?" Isara asked.
"A bit, but I’m hoping that sir Nickolas vouching for me will be enough to avoid it."
Cassian didn’t look particularly convinced by Leon’s words.
"And how do we know this isn’t just an elaborate trap set by the round table after they learned what we want to do?"
"A legitimate concern I can understand." The knight nodded. "That’s why I’ll take you to the dungeons after we finish eating - if you have any doubts you’ll be able to ask Nickolas himself, he’ll confirm everything I said."
"You want us to eat with you after you admitted to poisoning people?"
"We can go get food from the statue if that makes you feel better, I don’t particularly care."
According to Sylara poisons wouldn’t work on Calen anymore, so even if Leon will try anything he’ll be up for a nasty surprise.
But even more importantly, if he wasn’t lying they’ll get to finally meet a familiar face.