Inertia's armory was, unsurprisingly, in the heart of Mount Doom.
It wasn't actually called Mount Doom but when walking into an active volcano sometimes a little poetic license was required. Even with a tier three shield spell, I could feel the heat pressing against me from the outside. Thick waves of superheated matter passed us by, so hot I wasn't sure you could call it steam.
As we descended, a dull thud rippled through the air, pressing against us, making me even more aware of how thick the air had become.
The temperatures we were operating at made conversation difficult. Words were too distorted to understand with the high-pressures surrounding us. And every minute that dull thud would ripple the air, making the pressure even worse.
Most Forgeborn apparently couldn't survive these sorts of depths. Excellent passive security.
Even with my shield spells protecting Calbern and I, I wasn't sure how long we could survive in the depths either. My mana was ticking down surprisingly fast. Neither Tresla nor Inertia seemed too affected, though Inertia's frame did slow the deeper we went.
It took nearly an hour of descent into that dark tunnel, every minute another dull thud sounding in our ears, until finally we arrived within the armory of Forgelord Inertia.
For the first time, I understood what that title meant for her.
When she said it was an armory, I'd pictured weapons, maybe suits of armor for her to step into. What I had not pictured was a massive complex that dwarfed the entire industrial capacity of Cape Aeternia. The facility was large enough it could’ve produced five of our zeppelins side by side, with plenty of room to step between them. I took it all in as we passed deeper inside, stopping near a gantry at the end.
Within was a frame easily the size of the octo-hydra. And from within that frame came the dull thud that had been with us all the way from the surface.
It didn't require any guesswork to figure out what that dull thud was. Not anymore. I could see it, shining within the chest of that large frame.
A forge heart of incredible size and equally incredible power. I couldn't help but wonder if every one of the Forgelord had a heart like that.
If they did, where had the hearts even come from? That was not the sort of thing you simply found in any monster. There was a very short list, in fact, of creatures I could picture supplying such a heart. A list that started and stopped with the same name: Dragon.
When I thought about it, hydras could get pretty big too. I just hadn't seen one as large, not yet anyway. At the rate the Octo Hydra had grown, it probably did have a heart as big. That was the sort of thought that grew more terrifying the longer I dwelled on it, so I didn't.
Instead I followed Inertia, taking in the armory as we moved past the giant form. Apparently she’d just wanted to inspect if for a moment.
It felt a bit like stepping into a superhero's secret lair in the third movie, once they’d had time to build or collect a bunch of specialty suits.
There were over a dozen different bodies that were all distinctly Inertia. The color scheme and raptor-like head design being the most dominant features. Many of them also all had wings.
She came to a stop and looked at what seemed to be little more than a bump in the steel wall.
Until Tresla and Inertia stepped forward, each of them laying a hand on the wall. Hidden mechanisms hissed, shrouding us in steam as the wall slid open, revealing the contents.
The body that had been hidden within had a quality to it entirely different from all the other frames, except perhaps the giant one.
It had to be at least fourteen feet of gleaming metal. Not steel, not as I’d seen it on Ro’an or Earth. There was something about the texture that told me it was an unfamiliar alloy.
Inertia hissed, waving me and Calbern forward.
Tresla hadn't needed any such prompting and was already moving up on her other side. At first I wasn't entirely sure what we were assisting with but then Inertia held out her arm and Tresla took it. Calbern moved to the opposite side and I stepped next to Tresla, waiting.
The parts along Inertia’s arm started shifting and shuddering as they unbuckled, until the entire thing slipped free, dropping into our waiting hands.
It was a bit disquieting to pull my friend's arm away from her body. What was even more disquieting was realizing we'd be doing the same thing with all of her limbs, including her head.
Behind us, Tresla directed us to a frame where we set the arm. Then we moved to the next.
As we took her apart, piece by piece, I couldn't help but think of just how vulnerable she was in this state. Inertia was stuck between one body and the next.
We wrapped a harness around her chest to lift her off her legs. If any one of us had wanted to hurt her, all we'd need to do was stop the others from continuing. Not that we had to worry about that, not with those who were present.
I was glad the Starbreaker hadn't come along for this trip. Inertia hadn’t invited him, but he had a way of inserting himself where he wasn't wanted.
Eventually Inertia was reduced to little more than her Forgeheart and the frame around it.
What it must’ve been like to be nothing but a beating heart, no eyes or ears, I couldn’t even imagine. Her Forgeheart itself was different than I expected, banded in a style that was nothing like the Forgeheart that sat in the giant machine behind us, nor the much smaller Forgehearts we used in Aeternia.
Her Forgeheart somehow looked more mechanical, less alive, as if entirely fashioned of the same strange metal as the frame above us. Despite looking entirely machine, it also was smoother, more complete than a lot of the Forgehearts we used.
Technically, I'd seen her heart once before. Only glimpses between her damaged frame. Wasn’t easy to make out much between the waves of steam while dealing with the extreme heat that her Forgeheart threw off. Not exactly the best time to do an in-depth analysis. Now though I was shielded from the effects and she wasn't in danger.
Indulging my curiosity was safe.
Even so, I didn’t have long to see her that way. As soon as we set her on its frame, we moved to retrieve the more aggressive head from the chamber’s original set.
All told, she was without her head for less than a minute.
I wondered if perhaps if her second body had a voice box or greater ability to communicate, tapping my throat to get the idea across.
Inertia laughed at the suggestion, shaking the room even as the metal over her neck shifted and locked her replacement head into place. Despite being nearly twice as tall and wide, it had almost the same shape as the original head.
The same couldn't be said for the rest of her limbs. At least there were the same number.
We attached her legs first, a pair of taloned limbs that were inlaid with incredibly complex enchantments and piping.
The wings were a struggle, the weight of each pushing even Calbern’s new strength to its limits, despite the chamber having a crane to help lift them into place.
Her arms now sported attachments along their lengths. The right had what looked like the barrel of a gun. The left was wider, and I recognized several parts of a sheild enchantment worked in.
Every part of her new body also carried enchantments along the surface that seemed designed to interface with another set.
She still had a vaguely raptorish appearance. But while before she’d been a bird of prey, now she was a powerful killing machine. My gaze drifted behind her to the even larger frame. Not quite on the level of that behemoth, though I saw the resemblance.
Inertia stood flexing her replacement limbs, including cracking her neck at the either side.
Once she was done we stepped out of the bay. Behind us, the frames her previous limbs hung from slid into place, going on display much as her new form had been.
Inertia didn't head towards the exit but instead led us towards the giant war form with its beating dragon heart. She stopped in front of it, staring up and I came up beside her and we all came up beside her.
I tapped my head while holding up a golden Wave, hoping she’d get the idea.
Inertia let out a whistle-hiss of laughter, shaking her head even as she started to explain that her thoughts were worth far more than a single Wave. She let out a hiss-like sigh. "War," was all she said. That was enough. The word carried its weight.
I nodded as there wasn't anything good to say to that. She was right. It wasn't pleasant but as the world got worse we needed to pull out the big cards, get stronger.
And a Forgeborn frame bigger than an airship… I'd say that's a pretty massive upgrade in strength, especially when it's being powered by a dragon's heart.
When Inertia approached, four thick beams I thought had been armor detached, revealing themselves as mechanical arms. They dropped away from the chest where the heart continued its slow beat.
Inertia met the arms, stepping onto them, allowing herself to be carried up. The chest opened, and the thudding grew in intensity, causing a visible shimmer against my shield.
While the heart was slightly off to the left of the massive frame’s chest, Inertia stepped into a tight chamber on the right. I saw the surrounding machinery close about her even as the chest resealed itself, hiding her away. The thud increased in speed at the same time it diminished in volume.
Finally the head of the massive form looked up, the eyes flashing with the light of the forge.
Where her larger Forgelord form had shared the same head as I’d known Inertia to possess, this one was squatter. It hosted a pair of steam vents that ran parallel to the beak that seemed almost out of place on the avian face. Above her eyes sat a pair of horns that ran far back over her eyes.
The most remarkable difference was her hands. Or more accurately, her lack. The right was a giant blade. Lifting it, she split it into two and then spun it in a move that was sure to eviscerate anything she stuck it in.
After that quick test, she returned it to its dormant blade form, shifting her left arm upwards.
Like her Forgelord form, there was a cannon, though in this case it was nothing but cannon. It even had several smaller ones supporting the primary.
I was glad she didn't test that one, given our tight confines, even if they were only tight in comparison to the machine she was now part of.
Tresla stepped up beside me. She paused, a hint of red light escaping her hood. Then she floated up as the War form turned, apparently having shed the weight of gravity. Or maybe she was simply drawn towards something with an even greater weight.
Whichever it was, the back of Inertia's war machine opened, granting Tresla access. I had just enough time to see the cloak flutter as it was dropped, Tresla's light-singer form glimmering within before the machine resealed itself.
The cannon I’d been grateful she hadn't fired illuminated, lights of myriad colors running across its surface. The conversation I’d had with Starbreaker about the sort of desolation a wild light-singer could cause crossed my mind.
Together, I suspected my friends had once dealt their own share of devastation. And now they were preparing to do so again.
After she was satisfied with the function of her new larger form, Inertia turned in place. One massive hand pressed against what I had thought was the back wall of the armory.
The door creaked open as if it had rusted in place over a hundred years. Given what I knew of Inertia's past, it’d probably been longer. She strode forward, pushing through a collapsed tunnel. At first I hesitated but then moved to follow her. Calbern fell in beside me.
The ascent was faster than our descent. Inertia was pushing directly upward through, crushing rock beneath her now massive feet. It didn't take long before we reached the surface, though we were still within the confines of the volcano. The old lava tube was only recognizable for what it had originally been once we got near the exit.
As we stood in the bottom of the Ashforge abyss, Inertia turned towards me. Her head shifted as the eye zoomed in and locked on me, then she let out one thunderous word: "Hydra."