After enjoying the last few days of the harvest festival with Mileena and the twins, Akira could not put off the several pressing things that still needed to be checked up on.


    He left the castle with only Fluffball, Dolph, and Vilkas and headed towards a certain blacksmith shop. Loud construction noises could be heard coming from the castle where Humdol and the dwarves under him were working on the quick project.


    “Is that him?” asked a man who was fully covered up in thick winter clothes even though everyone else in Kodria was still only wearing light jackets. He was in a faraway building that had a wide view of the inner city.


    “How do you not know who the Duke is? Why did you even accept their request if this was the case?” asked a second man who was also bundled up to cover his identity.


    “I''m from the north, not like you guys. I also needed the money and the rewards are too good to give up.”


    “Will they really protect us and give us the rewards if we succeed,” asked a female with a scarf covering her face.


    “With their power, why would they lie? Let''s split up. If we try to act together the target will notice something and be on guard.”


    “I was going to say the same thing!”


    “May the best person win!”


    With that, they left the building and headed to pre-planned positions to test their luck.


    When Akira entered the blacksmith shop Delgar shot up from the small stool he was sitting on. In front of him were several dark pieces of heavy armor laid on top of the large but low table.


    There were several other old dwarves surrounding the table each with special glass spectacles in one eye as they looked over the armor.


    “We''re just inspecting it to make sure that everything is as it should be,” said Delgar as he looked at the armor proudly.


    “It''s finished already?” asked Akira happily.


    “Yes... a little too quick,” said Delgar with a slight frown on his face. “I only wanted their help for the final rune inscriptions... but when they heard of the new material and that the armor was to be made for you, they insisted that they help with everything. If not for them I could have spent another few days working on it by myself.”


    Akira was not sure why he was unhappy about finishing so soon.


    “Don''t be petty, how could we let you hog all the fun?” said one of the elderly dwarves who was still inspecting the black armor.


    A vein in Delgar''s forehead popped out as he heard this, his face had turned a slight red.


    “... and the results?” asked Akira.


    “There''s no need to worry. We made sure that no errors were made while we worked on it. This armor should be far superior to the slag you brought us,” said an elderly dwarf.


    “Why are you guys like this? Stop treating me like a child!” said Delgar.


    The elderly dwarves all silently raised an eyebrow showing their doubt but did not voice it.


    “Everything should be safe for the duke to use!” said one of the elderly dwarves as he took the spectacle from his eye.


    “This is my first time seeing such a rare metal. It has such a dark aura trapped inside it that it can''t help but leak out,” said the elder pointing to the armor.


    When Akira looked more closely he saw that there was a slight dark shimmer around the new dark armor.


    He walked up to the table and could feel the dark aura coming from the armor while he was still a few steps away. He reached over and picked up the Helmet to inspect it.


    Instead of the basic helmet that he had been expecting. He found the helmet to be a work of art that was in the shape of a black wolf''s head. When the face plate was opened it made the wolf look like it was howling.


    “Hurry up and try wearing the armor! If there are any problems we can quickly get to fixing them!” said one of the elderly dwarves gleefully.


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    “The second best part of our craft is indeed watching it get worn for the first time and then perfecting the armor ridding it of any minor problems.”


    “You guys do not need to do that! I can do it myself,” said Delgar.


    “There is no need to trouble yourself junior. We know that you have a large backlog of orders and we do not want to keep you away from such pressing matters for too long.”


    Delgar saw that they would not budge and angrily grumbled as he stomped off to a forge that was already warmed up and ready to be used.


    “Don''t mind him, he hasn''t slept for the last few days so he is easily irritated,” said an elderly dwarf. “Hurry and put on the armor!”


    “Does this set of armor have a name?” asked Akira.


    “Indeed it does, we named it the [Abyss Armor],” said the elderly dwarf.


    “I named it that!” shouted Delgar angrily from the opposite side of the large workroom.


    Without much need for further pushing Akira quickly grabbed the armor and put it on. Although it looked thinner than his old armor the weight was heavier.


    Ding!


    <table>


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td>


    You have equipped the full [Abyss] armor set.


    The Abyss armor set boost will be applied.


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Several other windows popped up vying for Akira''s attention but he ignored them as the elderly dwarves began inspecting him with well-practiced eyes only a few steps away.


    “It does indeed look like we had hoped!”


    “We did well to choose a nightmare as the theme.”


    “He truly is something from a nightmare.”


    “Yap!” said Fluffball, agreeing.


    Even if they said all this they were unfazed by his fierce appearance and the dark aura seeping out of the armor.


    Akira stood still and inspected himself along with the elderly dwarves.


    With the abyss armor now equipped, he could feel the armor''s dark aura seeping into his body.


    As he looked at everything, he noticed that there was a slight theme that they had gone with. Sharp.


    His elbows, knees, and tip of the boots were formed in a way that they could act as sharp weapons that could stab an opponent. His gauntlets were sharp like his claws.


    The rest of the armor was smooth and angled in a way to allow for weapons and arrows to slide off.


    The new armor felt roomy enough to not be suffocated, but at the same time, it was snug to the point that he would not bang around inside an oversized armor.


    The large shield that he now held in his left hand, was an inverted curved isosceles triangle tower shield that had sharp edges that could be stabbed into the ground for more support and or into the bodies of the enemy.


    The new black Abyss sword was sharper than any sword he had used before.


    One of the elderly dwarves moved around to look at his back for a second but stopped when he saw something.


    “You forgot to attach the last part!”


    Akira looked at the armor piece still on the table. It was a collection of scaled armor pieces contracted into a smaller semicircle. Since he did not know what it was he had not equipped it.


    Seeing his confusion the elderly dwarf grabbed it and pulled the smaller end of the scaled armor while holding the larger scaled piece. When it was fully extended it looked like a long snake made out of the half circle of interconnected scale armor.


    The elderly dwarf walked up to Akira and attached it to his butt. Akira had been feeling a slight draft but soon after it was blocked by the new piece of armor.


    “Your old armor had some major flaws regarding your demon race''s specialty. But we made sure to fix it in this set of armor so that nothing could be used against that weak spot.”


    Angry hammering rang out through the room.


    “Transform and test it out!” said the elder as he collapsed the sharp armor scales once again.


    Akira did so. With a Dark misty aura covering himself and the armor.


    The slight dark aura from the [Abyss] armor set became several more times noticeable as if it had been given a burst of power. Now the hazy darkness made it hard to properly look at Akira who was like a shimmering mirage of a sharp demon that one might find in the corner of your vision during a nightmare.


    There was no longer any extra room inside the armor as he was snugly embraced by the armor.


    His tail, which had sprouted out of his bottom, was now covered on the upper half by the semicircle-scaled armor pieces.


    “This armor will retract and extend with your tail as you need it. We worked hard on how to fix the imperfections from before! We hope you like it!”


    “I most definitely do!”


    “Do you feel uncomfortable? Any poky parts? Is it too tight or wide in certain areas?”


    “Nothing seems off, it all fits nice and with nothing irritating standing out,” said Akira as he moved around a bit and rotated his arms and legs.


    The elder dwarves all dragged short stools over to Akira and stood on them before beginning to inspect the armor up close.


    They used all sorts of techniques to test out the armor such as flicking certain spots with their fingers and then listening to the sound.


    This continued for a long time to the point Akira was getting stiff standing still.


    When he was nearing his limits Akira spoke up, “How is it?”


    With a slap to the armor one of the elderly dwarves jumped down from his stool and said, “It should be fine. With how much trouble it gave us when trying to smelt it and hammer it into shape, you won''t be having such a hard time with fire attacks if I had to guess.”