[center][h1][color=c4df9b]Uwné[/color][/h1]
[b]&[/b]

[img]https://i.imgur.com/3X6doyS.png[/img][/center]


Fifty-seven crystals floated over the area around the World-Anvil. All of them containing chaos and destruction taken from the land and crystalized. Some looked like they contained a gaseous substance. Other liquid or plasma. Some glowed, others were totally inert. Uwné was relentless as he hammered away at the fifty-eight crystal. It would take a long time until the world was pacified. But it was labor he was willing to perform.

As long as he wouldn’t be disturbed. He heard it first. It was a sort of shrieking noise. That then turned to the sound of raging fire. It came from above. Uwné looked up. Through the smoke clouds, he could already see it. Or rather the burning ball around whatever came from the Great Beyond. His eyes turned wide when he saw it coming straight from him. With destructive speed, it came crashing through the air. For a moment magic pulsed around it but it still came falling down.

A strong gust of wind pushed the meteor upwards. It flew over Uwné’s head and crashed a bit further away. The god of creation carefully limped his way towards the object. When he was close he could still feel the heat dissipating from what looked like a huge ruby. Curious, confused, and a bit concerned he poked it with his cane. Nothing happened. The shape was odd. Too angular, too straight. Deliberately made. Whatever it was before, magic had altered it when it came crashing into the world though. [color=c4df9b]“From the heavens now as well?”[/color] Uwné asked himself as he looked up. As he did, he felt forlorn somehow. Something was missing in the skies. That would be something to work on after the crystals perhaps. In the distance, another streak of smoke plunged through the clouds and crashed into the world. Then another and another. Some broke apart as they fell. Others let out deathly shrieks of a creature in pain. Whatever was sending the objects had to be cruel. To send one over and over and over again. Only to watch them transform by what Uwné now considered the protective shield of the continent he stood on. Assured that the world was safe from invaders from the beyond, the god of crafting returned to his work.

That changed when he felt the air itself shudder and groan. Something pulled on the very rock and stone from above. Uwné looked up again. He saw something titanic hurling through the heavens. Consuming magic. [color=c4df9b]“No… No!”[/color] The god shouted, finishing the ninety-seven crystal with a final smash.

[color=c4df9b]“I will not let it happen.”[/color] He said as he raised his free hand. From beneath his feet, molten rock and metal seeped through the tiny cracks of the ground. The flows twisted around each other each time producing a closed lotus flower. The outer sides of the petals were made of nacre. Soon on the barren stone all around the World-Anvil over a hundred of such lotuses had grown. Just in time. Uwné saw something crashing through the world again. This time it wasn’t transmuted. He could sense many metals. Iron and gold and copper. None of it made sense. But it instilled a fear in him. The invaders had weakened the Continent’s magical shield.

Then his worst extraterrestrial fear became real. Something larger than the objects before came through the clouds riding fire. It shifted and changed. Controlling its descend until it pierced the clouds and rejected its shell. High up there floating over the land was a diamond-shaped thing that radiated power Uwné had only ever felt deep from within him.

[color=c4df9b]“This world has enough to deal with already. Return where you once came from!”[/color] Uwné shouted and the very winds carried his voice. The lotuses bloomed revealing the silver inside of the petals and the golden core. A finger-thin beam of light shot forth from one of the flowers. First harmlessly hitting the side of the diamond. Then the light turned blazing hot in an attempt to pierce the shape and destroy it.

The blue spotlight on the invader at first continued its roaming when the small shot hit, the impacts causing only ripples on a thin barrier protecting its outsides. Only when the stronger beam hit did it react, flailing around wildly as the heat caused the entire glow around its perimeter to sputter out at once. Then a great glowing shield unfurled in front of its spotlight. Which meant it was still facing the entirely wrong way. After a fraction of a moment it swung round and placed the quarter sphere of a barrier, thick blue and partially translucent, in between it and the fire beams and, in doing so, the machine discovered Uwné.

The blue light of its single eye shone down upon the god like a spotlight, illuminating the anvil and surrounding area as the new barrier absorbed the fire, and the heat damage they had done rapidly wiped away from the surface of the machine by an unseen hand. Yet it did not lash out immediately, instead seemingly observing the god from on high as it fixed him with its unblinking gaze.  

[color=c4df9b]“Begone!”[/color] Uwné shouted. The other lotuses bloomed open. Over a hundred thin beams of light aimed at the floating Diamond. The energy shot was not of heat but freezing cold now. Mist enveloped the thin beams. For a moment there was snow but that quickly melted away as it fell too far from the beams.  The god of Crafting hoped it would be enough to break through whatever protection the invader had and knock it out of the sky forever.

In response, the shield flickered and then quickly changed color to a warm red, and continued to absorb the lotus’s strikes.

Then a grasping hungry field appeared along the start of the beam, reaching out towards the lotuses but failing to reach them, petering out only a short distance from the machine. Then it turned off and the spotlight moved, bringing the barrier with it and briefly exposing itself to the cold rays. It seemed to flinch, and then the invader put the barrier back in place and left it there this time, before scanning the landscape and then finding what it wanted. Far away several large boulders floated up off the ground, wrapped in a blue glow, and were then hurled at the lotus garden.

Many fell short, the toss scattershot and almost clumsy  but some aimed true. [color=c4df9b]“No!”[/color] Uwné yelled. He took two steps limping, supported by his cane. Then shot forward into flight. Smashing himself into one of the flung stones. It shattered upon impact and stone showered down. Then he flew into the next and the next. Every single one that would have destroyed the lotuses was pulverized by self-sacrifice.

When the last stone was destroyed Uwné kept floating in the air. [color=c4df9b]“Leave this place now!”[/color] The god shouted again as he waved over his lotuses. All of them began to slowly rise up from the ground, spreading out in the air. Their beams started to fluctuate. One moment they were hidden in a self-made mist, the next the very air around them burned.

It was enough. Still floating in the air Uwné gritted his teeth. For a second something pulsed over him. For a moment revealing a form made of nebulae of all colors. [color=c4df9b]“I will not let you take this place. These people. They have suffered enough!”[/color]

The barrier too, fluctuated, shifting from blue to red and then back again, chasing and then catching the rhythm of the beams as a glowing green line formed across the eye.

[color=LightSteelBlue]”yehsofomarias rheanreas ransre ter x fasd djna”[/color] the thing echoed, the line worbaling like the depiction of a waveform as it emitted garbled tones and white noise until it snapped into meaning screeched in a poor mimicry of the human tongue run through crude degraded wires, circuitry and heavy compression [color=LightSteelBlue]”There’s nothing out there!”[/color] 

Stones rose all around it as it spoke but instead of futility soaring forth once more smaller beams shot out the side of the craft and struck them, bringing them together, beginning the process of molding them into something new. Vaguely humanoid forms, towering in size, rapidly began to coalesce out of the raw materials it had raised up.

For a moment Uwné was taken aback when it made the weird sound, and even more so when it talked in an actual language. For a second he felt compassion and wanted to lower the lotuses again. But then it grabbed the stone and started to mold it into what he could only assume would be golems.

Golems to invade the world with. [color=c4df9b]“Cease your invasion!”[/color] Uwné said, his own voice sounded distorted at first. [color=c4df9b]“Cease it now or be destroyed.”[/color] His voice now sounded deeper, impossibly deep and low. He spoke with the voice of something titanic in shape. Power pulsed across his skin again. His core – as the god of crafting – exposed itself. Radiating pure divinity as his True Form was almost unleashed.

Meanwhile, the lotuses had kept floating upwards. A swarm of silverly gleaming flowers now hung between the ground and the black clouds. Their beams shifted from the main shield towards the golems being made in an attempt to destroy those now.

[color=LightSteelBlue]”You cannot force me to leave the only world”[/color] the machine stated simply, its voice less maddening than before but still heavily plated with artificially. 

The shield dropped as soon as it stopped being focused and the construction of the golems seemed to intensify as a result. Many were blown apart by heat or cold or both, but the rest formed into metallic angles of death, unfurling great wings upon which blue flames flared. 

And then promptly dropped from the sky.

The Golems smashed into the earth in a rain of metal as the eye of the machine glanced around with what might have been frantic horror, only for many of the machens to haul themselves off of the ground, hoist their weapons, and charge, a touch unsteadily, across the broken wastes in a wave of steel towards the god and his anvil.  

Again Uwné felt a moment of compassion. It was looking for a place to live. That was only natural. Could this continent not be a sanctuary for all life? Even if it wasn’t born here?

[color=c4df9b]“If you had come in peace I would’ve welcomed you.”[/color] Uwné said. His lotuses focused on the golems marching towards his most holy of sites. [color=c4df9b]“But you came as a conqueror. Assailing this land.”[/color] To add to his point Uwné flicked his wrist. The large ruby drone he had retrieved before was flung towards the middle between the golems and the lotuses. [color=c4df9b]“You started this war. I shall see it to an end if I must.”[/color] Uwné spoke not with malice. Not with hate or joy. There was only sadness in his voice.

And when he spoke those words his form rippled once more. This time, it exploded as well. It exploded in a storm of colors and celestial heat. It exploded into the base stuff of pure creation and the gleaming stars that formed within. He looked faceless yet his visage revealed endless possibility. In his right hand, he wielded a hammer made out of the stuff of suns and he was ready to use it. His titanic True Form revealed itself.

It visibly flinched back from him as he unveiled his true form. Despite his great size, however, the invader was larger still as it hung in the sky, and so it recovered quickly, staring down at him.

Two titans stood with their armies ready for war, a war the world might not survive. 

Then the light of the machine glanced down at the ruby. Back up at him. Then back down to focus on the ruby for a longer moment and then back up to him. Its armies suddenly faltered

[color=LightSteelBlue]”That is a probe”[/color] it stated. [color=LightSteelBlue]”was a probe”[/color] it corrected itself

The silver lotuses kept shooting for a bit longer, but when Uwné noticed the armies had stopped, he ceased as well. It would appear a tentative ceasefire was reached. Somehow. [color=c4df9b]“What’s a probe?”[/color] He then asked. Before he just assumed it was some projectile lobbed at the Continent.

[color=LightSteelBlue]”A probe is… one moment let me do this properly”[/color] there was a brief pause. The machine’s vocalization was getting a lot better, only slightly tinged with artificiality now [color=LightSteelBlue]”’A probe is an unmanned and unintelligent spacecraft designed to be launched from a vehicle in order to scout distant locations. Probes have limited maneuvering capabilities and rely primarily on its initial launch for speed. Useful for remotely surveying worlds, asteroids or other space phenomena via fly by. However the probe is not suitable for in-atmosphere scouting as it is incapable of surviving re-entry or navigating within it’...”[/color] it said, clearly reading, complete with looking up and slightly to the right at nothing while doing so, before focusing on Uwné again. [color=LightSteelBlue]”In hindsight I should have asked that before using them,”[/color] it admitted, managing to inject some emotion for the first time, in this case, sheepishness.

Sheepishness Uwné mirrored. [color=c4df9b]“Ah…”[/color] The gasses that made up his body dissipated around him as the stars flickered out. Revealing underneath all of that his first, mortal form again. [color=c4df9b]“A scout.”[/color] He probably should’ve examined the clump of ruby closer. [color=c4df9b]“I suppose… yeah that would… yeah.”[/color] The god said as he mentally went over some thoughts. All gears now neatly fell in place. Even though Uwné could only fully understand about half the things the big Diamond said.

[color=c4df9b]“Well… I think in that case we got off on the wrong foot.”[/color] The god said. [color=c4df9b]“I am Uwné.”[/color]

[color=LightSteelBlue]”It did not help that I did not prepare a communication system, or consider how my investigation would appear to those below. I apologize.”[/color] it said. Below it its army had turned around and was gathering before it. [color=LightSteelBlue]”I am... One moment”[/color] it said, flicking its sight down onto the election of machines and activating the field it had failed to reach him with earlier, which rapidly de-constructed the robots and pulled their resources up into the floating machine.

[color=LightSteelBlue]”I am called Explorer. Apparently”[/color] It continued as if nothing had happened.

[color=c4df9b]“Explorer. That sounds more like a job than a name, doesn’t it?”[/color] Uwné said. [color=c4df9b]“So do you intend to explore this world?”[/color] He continued as he looked around. [color=c4df9b]“Or what’s left of it…anyway.”[/color] He added quickly, realizing in what a state the Continent was in. It had been part of a greater, lush world before. The god of crafting knew that much. The explorer, wherever it came from, was probably sent out to explore that world. Not the sad remains of it now. 

[color=c4df9b]“I’m sorry that you came all this way for a world as broken as this one.”[/color] Uwné said solemnly.

[color=LightSteelBlue]”I suppose it does. Or a title. For a name name let’s go with... Exo”[/color] it decided, before taking another glance around the broken remains of the world [color=LightSteelBlue]”We work with what we are given I suppose? Also I’ll admit, I am not entirely sure how I got here or where I am from. There is, as I said (rather poorly I’ll admit), nothing out there. Just a ring of debris circling this continent within which I appear to have lost my memories, and then beyond that nothingness. Forever.”[/color]

[color=LightSteelBlue]”Perhaps I came through one of those gateways that seem to be part of the current mess? Or there used to be things out there and I left them when they stopped existing and came to the only thing that was left. I am unsure.”[/color] it theorized. The machine had floated closer as they talked so as to reduce the amount of shouting going on.

The confirmation that nothing else was out there stung more to Uwné than he had thought. Deep below he knew there should be so much more. The foundational building blocks of existence should be out there. Trillions of stars. Great shapes of creation. 

[color=c4df9b]“That’s possible,”[/color] Uwné said as the Explorer – no, Exo – talked about his origin. [color=c4df9b]“I might have come from one of those portals myself. I don’t really remember anything until I was standing here, in an ashen plane. I think this used to be a forest.”[/color] As if answering his prayers the god of crafting heard a rumbling far off in the distance. Then water came raging from the edge. Carrying with it all the filth and dirt it had picked up along the way. It had fallen into some old riverbed and followed that course again. Until it reached the void coast and dropped down into nothingness.

The whole phenomenon made Uwné smile. [color=c4df9b]“Seems like I’m not the only one trying to repair this world.”[/color] He said as he watched the water flowing, before turning back at Exo. [color=c4df9b]“So what will you do now? Remain a giant Diamond shape hovering over the world? I’d imagine that would make exploring the caves below hard.”[/color]

[color=LightSteelBlue]”It seems not”[/color] Exo agreed with interest as it watched the event unfold with him, before replying to his question of size, [color=LightSteelBlue]”I have machines for the places I cannot go. Though doing things in person has worked out better so far. I will have to think about it, see if I can perform that transformation of yours in reverse. But that can wait, there is still plenty to see up here.”[/color]

The machine ceased its scanning of the water and returned its gaze to him [color=LightSteelBlue]”I feel like I still owe you more than an apology, Uwné. I have made you spend time and resources you could have directed towards your task.”[/color] it said, [color=LightSteelBlue]”Is there anything I can do to assist you to make up for that?”[/color]

[color=c4df9b]“You owe me nothing.”[/color] Uwné said as he waved his hand, dismissing the issue altogether. [color=c4df9b]“I would, however, like to ask you a favor. As you can see, I’m pitifully immobile at times.”[/color] He said as he tapped his hip giving him the limp walk in his mortal form. [color=c4df9b]“But travel and exploration reveal interesting things of the world. Interesting substances. I have no doubt that you’ll find many rare metals, gems, fabrics, chemicals, and other materials. Bring some to me, if you would. I might be able to craft some tools to aid your exploration.”[/color]

[color=LightSteelBlue]”That I am more than capable of doing. Infact, let me begin right away”[/color] Exo said, before raising their eye up, ejecting some of the material that used to be part of the golems into the air in front of them and then forming it into two stacks of metal bars, before lowering those down to offer to the Uwné. 

[color=LightSteelBlue]”These I gleaned from the remains of a large and aggressive creature that came from one of those portals that opened up in the ring I awoke from. One attracts the energy that transformed my probe into ruby, the other reppels it. I hope you will find them useful. Those gateways likely hold the key to many more wonders in equal numbers to their dangers which I intend to investigate along with this world.”[/color] they informed him

[color=c4df9b]“Attract and repel magic?”[/color] Uwné said as he let a hand run over the first stack of metal. Even now he felt the magical force drawn towards it. How strong was it? Could it be made stronger? Weaker? What would an alloy of the two do? Would heat alter their properties? Would it work forever or would there be a limit to it? [color=c4df9b]“Fascinating.”[/color] Uwné said, completely absorbed for a moment by the metal. Its uses will be myriad for sure.

Then, far behind Uwné yet still close enough to see it, lava violently exploded into the world from a newly made crack in the land. More noxious gasses joined the atmosphere. Uwné’s almost childlike enthusiasm faded as he looked back up towards Exo. [color=c4df9b]“I think I should return to my work first. Before there are only rocks in various states to examine for you. It has been a pleasure meeting you Exo and I hope we will meet again soon.”[/color]

[color=LightSteelBlue]”That would be a sad state of affairs. It was interesting to meet another. I hope I will do so again,”[/color] it paused for a moment and then asked [color=LightSteelBlue]”If I do, would it help if I directed them here, to this area you are working to make safe?”[/color]

[color=c4df9b]”I would like that so very much.”[/color] Uwné said with a smile and then he limped back towards the Anvil. 

[color=LightSteelBlue]”Then I will do so. Till we meet again”[/color] it said, bidding him farewell.

The lamplight of the great machine left him then, as the wandering explorer departed, drifting away seeking to find all that there was to find and see all that there was to see, leaving the crumbled shell of magic resistant metal and the carcasses of the golems destroyed before they had even been made behind. A memory of a battle between titans that ended in mutual understanding.

Though on his way Uwné stopped to hold one of the floating lotuses in the palm of his hand. It was pretty big in his one hand though. [color=c4df9b]“What am I going to do with you?”[/color] He asked, then he looked up again. His divine senses pushed beyond the cloud layer to see the vast nothingness Exo had promised there was. [color=c4df9b]“Yes, I suppose this world could use a little light. A little hope. Drift off, little one.”[/color] Uwné raised the lotus up and it continued to lazily fly upwards. Together with most the other lotuses. Untouched they flew through the clouds to meet the vast black expanse. They flew higher and further still. Spread out over the whole continent. Until from the surface, if you could look through the clouds, you could only see them as tiny silver specs on a vast, black canvas.

But some remained to lazily drift through the air around Uwné. He waved over the earth around the Anvil crumbled and vanished. The emptiness was soon filled by some water the god of crafting took from the nearby flowing river to fill it up. Then the flowers drifted down again, to rest upon the water. Like their kin high above they too glowed with the silver light of stars.

[hider=Summary]Uwné witnesses one of Exo’s drones drop through the atmosphere and fears the land is being attacked from yet another side. Though feels safe in knowing that magic apparently protects them. That lasts until the Siphon is hurled through the Continent’s air and Exo pierces through. Uwné, believing the world is attacked by extraterrestrials, creates flowers that shoot magical energy and commands the entity to leave.

He and Exo go back and forth a bit, sending rocks and oscillating the energies from hot to cold and back. Uwné even transforms into his True Form. Though both sides soon realize that Exo is in fact not trying to invade the world. The two take a step back (metaphorically) and introduce each other. Exo explains his predicament (that he doesn’t know who send him or from where). Both sides become amicable and Uwné asks Exo that if he finds interesting substances that he bring some to the god of crafting. Exo obliges and already offers up the magical repelling and attracting metals.

Uwné says his farewell when he realizes his work is not yet done and they both say their goodbyes. The lotuses, first weapons, are repurposed to create the illusion of a stary sky in over the Continent. Though some of them remain around the Anvil.[/hider]