Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

Chapter 1411. Cestus of Amycus

Seth looked at it for a long while, checking the new options created by the sudden synergy. He didnʼt know who Amycus was, and the changes only made sense after he went to refresh his knowledge of Olympian Mythology.

Amycus was the son of Poseidon and not a nice guy at all. He was one of those run-of-the-mill demigods who picked fights with better-known heroes and demigods. Amycus, in this case, was a king who liked to pick fist fights with people who traveled through his land.

This usually ended in death for the visitor, as he was known for his incredible strength and skill with his fist, as well as his cruelty in battle. As fate had it, Amycus picked a fight with the wrong demigod and got punched to death by someone better in boxing.

With the influence of Amycus, many options had changed, the most obvious being the , which was supposed to be , the effect of his forging ballad, together with the addition of 75 points in strength.

would have raised unarmed combat skills by 1 level and raised unarmed damage by 25%. raised unarmed combat skill by 2 levels, unarmed damage by 50%, damage to unarmored target by 50% and granted 15% armor penetration.

Since the skill was on both gauntlets and it wasnʼt stated that they didnʼt stack, it meant that Paolo could gain 4 levels in unarmed combat skill, double unarmed damage, double damage to targets without armor, and gain 30% armor penetration. This change alone would have already been enough, but it kept going.

The next changes due to the synergy were among the skills of the set effect. had turned into , lowering the slow after the swing to 0.2 seconds and raising the additional damage to 100%.

Apart from changing the haymaker, there was another additional skill to the set effect, , most likely a derivative of , judging by the similarities in name and effect. On that note, Seth had been wrong concerning the enchantment.

It did not hold the power of decay, but it was able to ignore equipment defense and directly strike the opponent. As expected of the creature that cleaned the flesh from the bones of corpses, the effect of the strike was nasty. The was similar in nature but different in effect.

The effects sounded less mystic but were even more effective. As expected from someone who was called the Mauler, for maiming his victims in forced combat. Having checked all the changes, Seth put on the gloves. They were a little too small for him, but not too small to wear.

Putting on the gauntlets activated the effect, and they generated a pale-purple skintight energy shield surrounding the hands. These were the barrier gloves Rún had created according to Sethʼs specifications.

What was the point in covering the gloves with another layer of barriers? It was to maximize Impact Conversion, and effect that only activated when the armor plate itself received the impact. Originally, that was.

Not only did the barrier add an additional 1500 defense to the gauntlets that would cut the quite low durability some slack, but the barriers were designed to concentrate and distribute the impact of any strike onto the armor plates of . It could also dampen the impact to prevent damage to the item.

This way, he was able to not only provide ample defense but also take full advantage of Impact Conversion, which converted 5% of incoming physical damage into mana after the quartz was upgraded to special.

5% didnʼt sound very impressive alone, but it depended entirely on the physical damage blocked or dished out. Technically, Paolo could simply go and punch some grass to refill his mana if he ever ran out. But that was not all, there was one final, hidden feature to it, one not mentioned in the descriptions.

The effects and skills of items with a soul rarely had a cost, as Seth used a soul big enough to pay for the skills. However, these skills still had a cooldown to accommodate the fact that the souls also had to regenerate mana after spending it on active skills.

This meant, in theory, that when Impact Conversion refilled the itemʼs own mana, it would also automatically reset the cooldown of skills. Paolo would literally be able to punch away the cooldowns of the item skills.

To test his theory, the blacksmith started punching the wall of the workshop to test his theory, starting by using the and digging his fist in the rock, before hitting it with his left, without using a skill. As expected, but still happily surprised, he found that the cooldown of had gone down by several seconds at once.

If someone like Paolo, specialized in unarmed combat, did this, maybe using one of his own skills, the cooldown would probably be gone in a matter of two or three strikes, enabling the close combat priest to constantly fire the skills, if he wanted to.

Otherwise, he could also simply use the conversion to punch the ground and fill his own mana after releasing a slew of spells. Ultimately, Seth found that the had become infinitely more useful after it was upgraded with divine power.

After the little test run, Seth decided to finish for the day and deliver his new product right away.

...

“Wait, why can you use soul contracts?” the angel asked, perplexed, as Seth went through the usual procedure with Paolo. Like all members of the Field teams that received legendary items, the Angel Summoner was also obliged to sign the soul contract that would prevent him from using the item against Minas Mar or giving it away.

Most legendary items actually counted as lent from Minas Mar. The only exceptions were when the people brought their own materials, like Paolo or the other chosen ones. Since they brought the legendary material, they only had to pay Seth for the processing and sign the contract that they would not use them against Minas Mar.

“My secondary class is Infernal Scald; the skill came as I improved it,” Seth explained nonchalantly.

“Wait! You should read it first!” Novia cautioned the saint, but Paolo was already signing the contract.

“Itʼs just the standard contract anyone in the field teams signed to get their legendary item, right?” Paolo said, unbothered by the fact that he just signed a contract using his soul as collateral. Much to Noviaʼs dismay.

“Jup, no fine print at all,” Seth assured him. “Here are the gauntlets, and I have written all the effects and skills down in case you forget something,” the blacksmith said after pocketing the signed contract. He pushed a pair of gauntlets and a sheet of folded paper over the table toward Paolo, who picked up the new items with shining eyes.

He put them on, and his face lightened up together with the thin barrier. Getting a new toy like this, Paolo finally showed some of the youthful fascination and curiosity the harsh reality had driven out of him.

“I will leave you to it then. You can try them out in one of the training rooms, or maybe go hunt in the Abyss if you would like to,” Seth judged that Paolo was strong enough to go to the depths of the Adventurer Guildʼs Holy Land.

“I will, thank you.”