Blacksmith Of The Apocalypse Novels & Stories

No longer cloaked in the beauty of his delusion his beastly appearance was visible to the world. “And you are one ugly son of a bitch.” Lucifer reeled and Gabriel took his chance. He lunged forward but Lucifer let out a roar so powerful it blew him tumbling back toward the tree line. The Reapers leaped to their feet swords at the ready. “This world and everything in it is going to burn,” Lucifer seethed. “For I am the apocalypse!”

The cageborn paused, head tilting, as if considering him. Then it lunged. Kieran threw up his arms— and the cageborn slipped through them like smoke, striking his chest. Kieran screamed as black tendrils spread across his skin like frost burning hot. He collapsed, convulsing, eyes rolling back. “No!” I shouted, and the word tried to become panic— I crushed it into a decision. “OFF,” I said. Ash surged from the runes—black cinders lifting like a storm—slamming into the cageborn and ripping it off Kieran’s chest in a violent pull. The creature skidded across the floor, shrieking.

I had underestimated just how shameless they were. She continued, "Each of them is built like a tank. It's the end of the world. Why would they settle for taking orders from you? Even if you have all the money in the world, what does it matter?" It hit me all at once. Victoria was right. In the apocalypse, no one wanted to be under someone else. The man whose arm had been snapped on the first day cursed beside her. His resentment was obvious. "Stop wasting time talking to him. I say we break the door down right now. I'll cripple him myself and throw him out to the zombies."

His hands were shoved deep into his pockets, physically restraining himself from touching me. "I have run the Apex Bloom for seven years, Lolita," Franco began. His voice was a low, gravelly vibration that sent a familiar, heavy heat curling through my stomach. "It was designed with a singular, unbreakable architecture. A crucible. You throw the elite into the dark, and you let the pressure crush them until only one diamond remains. Every single iteration before this ended the same way: one victor, and a trail of liquidated corpses." He took a step closer. The space between us evaporated. The scent of sandalwood and something distinctly, electrically masculine wrapped around me.

"This is the Blackwood Project files. Every name, every donor, every politician who funded this mess. If we get out, the world will know the truth." The elevator stopped. The doors didn't open; they were ripped off their tracks from the outside. A wave of heat hit them. The upper lab was a disaster. The ceiling was partially collapsed, showing the dark sky outside. Rain was pouring in hissing as it hit the wreckage. In the center of it all stood the Apex. Damon was no longer the man Elara loved. He was seven feet tall a mix of fur and black scales. His skin was glowing with crimson runes. He was surrounded by soldiers. They weren't shooting. They were screaming as he moved through them.

The reinforced steel gate opened slowly. Years of dust and weather groaned through its heavy hinges as sunlight spilled across the concrete courtyard beyond. No one lowered their weapons immediately. Neither side trusted easily anymore. That was what almost three years of the apocalypse had taught everyone. Natasha remained where she was, her heartbeat had finally begun to settle, but her thoughts had not. The image of the Night Hunter being thrown backward replayed over and over inside her mind. It's not as if she touched or fired at it. She hadn't even raised her hand, yet something inside her responded.

Above us, the fifteen-ton mechanical hammer reached the bottom of its secondary swing. The concussive pressure wave hit the dais first, a wall of dense, superheated gravity that slammed my spine flat against the lodestone runes. The skin of my palms, already peeled to the red meat, fused completely with the glowing patterns as I funneled the volatile, surging hybrid fire from my core straight into the primary anchor bolts of the anvil. The hammer didn't hit the stone this time. It hit the very air above the moat.

He sneers. There it is. Doesn't matter how many years pass, they never forget what I am. I push myself off the stone floor slowly, joints stiff from another night pressed against the damp wall. I don't rush. I don't stumble. Weakness gets noticed here, and noticed things don't last long. I step into the thin strip of torchlight spilling through the open cell. The guard looks... disappointed. They always are. After hearing stories about the Thalorien traitors, people expect something terrifying. A monster. A girl with madness in her eyes.

I continued. The Blacksmith picked up an iron bar resting against the workbench and tossed it into the furnace with a practiced movement. The embers reacted immediately, spitting small orange sparks. “Verisure stopped having decent food a long time ago,” he replied as he adjusted the fire with a metal rod. “So we started growing whatever we could.” He shrugged. “Roots, fungi, anything that survives this hellish cold. That’s enough to feed most of the creatures here.” He pulled another piece of metal closer before continuing, “But not the dark witches. They need clean blood.” His remaining eye finally lifted toward me. “They came to me a few months ago. They wanted me to forge weapons.”

I found a wounded giant wolf. After the world ended, I treated him as my strongest fighter and a living source of warmth, curling against him to sleep every night. Later, once he healed, he turned into a man and warned me with a savage look, "I'm the Alpha of a werewolf pack. I have responsibilities to my people. Don't think you can make me stay." And with that, he left. I pulled my ragged blanket tighter, confused. What was he talking about? I had been keeping him as a dog the whole time. What did his responsibilities have to do with me? Later, I rescued a foolish husky from a pile of zombies. When I led him back to my crumbling shelter, I found the heir to the werewolf pack crouched at my