Harkon had arrived shortly before Velkoros' shipment of mining supplies and Harkon almost immediately got to work, organizing the village with Bernard and creating new jobs for anyone who needed them. of which there was a lot, so they were paid a wage of two silvers an hour, which Bernard said was an overly generous amount, but he couldn't care less, they were working for him he'd decide their wage. So they started the mining operation, with the magic pickaxes digging through the stone like digging through a dry crumbly dirt, and they put the first support pillars, in and the runes on the metal posts glowed, and the ceiling seemed to be surrounded by some kind of glowing forcefield, that held up the ceiling for at least fifty feet. After a week of mining and turning their one tunnel into a maze they found many magic infused ores and crystals, but on the seventh day they found their first mithril vein. Harkon saw the uncovering and inspected the vein, even grabbing the pickaxe of one of the miners and clearing out an area around the vein like he was dusting off sand from a fossil, from the area he cleared out, it went on for a hundred feet down the tunnel and disappeared into the end of the tunnel where the tunnel dead ended. Bernard came into the mine a few minutes later and did a happy dance when he saw the glimmering blue reflection of the silvery ore.

"This is excellent Baron! our village will be rich! We can afford some actual roads, patrols, security, renovations, we're finally going to have a future." He said, smiling like a farm hand who just got lucky with the farmers daughter, but he ended by breaking down in tears while the miners started cheering and laughing around him, the lead miner shouted "Drinks are on me tonight boys!"

Harkon raised the pickaxe and slammed it into the mithril ore and he actually had to do that several times to break off a sizable chunk from the vein, and tossed it to the miners. then be broke another chunk and tossed it to another miner, then another, and another until every single person there had a chunk of Mithril in their hands. "All did good work, take it as a small reward."

This got further cheers from the miners and they all started to leave, when a teeth rattling boom rattled the mountainside, Pado held up Harkon's axe in it's jaws and he grabbed it, he marched toward the mine entrance only to find someone had apparently sealed it off.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alexi finished up rigging the explosives. "Do you think this will be enough Nezz?"

Nezzrath a dark elf with dark tinted glasses said, as he patted the air with his hand, a black jeweled glove on his right hand accented by black robes, a black widow spider the size of a man's fist crawled onto his shoulder as he caressed a cane with a spider figurine at it's head. "I don't care how powerful this man is, he can't move a mountain, if that fat bastard said drop a mountain on him and paid us to do it, then that's what we're gonna fucking do."

Nezzrath, Class, Battlemage, Specialized, Arachnomancer. Level 11

Kaso sighed, his hand on the sheathed katana at his side,. "You couldn't have found a better job for us? Sure the pay is nice but the risk of angering this guy isn't something I'm keen on doing."

Kaso, Class, Rogue, Specialized, Ronin. level 7

Marius slapped Kaso on the back, his black plate armor decorated with silver. "Don't be such a coward, we'll do the job and go home."

Marius, Class, Knight, Specialized Dark Knight. level 9.

Kaso chuckled. "You say I'm being a coward but you're not even going to face this guy head on, you're just throwing a mountain at him and calling it a day, you're not even gonna see his face, doesn't that piss you off? You are a knight after all."

Alexi, slid down the slope and walked back to the others. "Rigging's set, just flip the lever as always, I'm gonna go get a drink." Alexi said, his flintlocks on his bandolier as he walked.

Alexi, Class, craftsman, Specialized, powder keg. Level 4.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"What did you just say you kimono wearing shit?" Marius said, grabbing the front of Kaso's Gi.

"What, you need someone to clean your ears out?" He said, pointing a tanto at the side of the man's head the small blade all but tickling the man's earhole.

"Gentlemen please, no need to get so aggressive, we just got here and you're already bickering." Nezz said, waving his hand through the air and a thin cut appeared on Marius' and Kaso's cheeks, they both immediately backed off from each other. "Alexi, if you'd kindly." Nezzrath said.

"Course boss." Alexi said, and pumped the lever collapsing the mountainside and causing a landslide covering the mines entrance.

"Well, that should be that." Marius said, walking away, after his twenty fifth step he heard a muffled Thump, then a muffled crunch, then again, and again.

Nezzrath looked at the cave entrance confused and then concerned when more rocks started shaking.

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Harkon kicked the boulder in front of him causing it to budge an inch but little more, so he held out a hand. "Pick axe." He said. one of the miners gave it to him and he grabbed it with one hand and swung, the axe tore through it like he was digging through clumped sand. he swung back in the other direction this time half of the boulder was gone, he kept swinging even as other rocks and dirt fell in taking the first rocks place. when he noticed a pile of gravel was piling up behind him, he shouted. "Level it out, don't let it build up."

They did so, almost raking it across the floor like a new carpet, eventually they saw light of the day outside. and Harkon shoved the rest of the rocks out of his way. he marched out, and saw a group of stunned looking men, a dark elf with a cane, a knight in dark armor, some guy in a bathrobe, and a dwarf with a couple of flintlocks.

Harkon hefted tossed the pickaxe to the rocky ground and walked out into the snow toward the adventuring team. The knight took a step forward and hefted a claymore and proceeded to charged him and swing the long sword only for Harkon to grab it by it's blade his thick skin getting slightly cut by the rather dull sword, though the force of the blow did cause a blast wave toward his body, he twisted his wrist and the tip broke off, and Harkon slammed the tip into the man's forehead like an over sized ice pick, causing him to fall down dead. Harkon didn't even break his stride before a bullet whizzed past his head, and another hit him in the arm, that pierced his skin, he was surprised someone managed to get their hands on gun powder much less a gun, much less two. He walked up to the frantically reloading man and reached over to his arm and stuck a pair of fingers into his wound gritting his teeth as he grabbed the bullet and ripped it out and flicked it back at the gunman, it slammed into his forehead and he dropped dead, a hole in his skull. Harkon watched the man in the Gi start running away, only to find his body running away from his head, his body made it three whole steps before it collapsed into the stone, a few webs glistened with blood, though some of it glistened with a bluish reflection from the silvery threads that protruded from the dark elves fingertips, mithril threads. "Oh please, you're all useless, a meat shield who runs isn't useful to me at all." The man sighed, before looking back at Harkon. "Is there a chance we could talk this out?"

Harkon held up a hand and it flew toward him from the caves entrance and he caught it. "No."

The dark elf sighed. "I feared you'd say that." He swiped his gloved hand to the side and the bloodstained threads formed into a pattern and stamped the snow, a bloody summoning sigil formed all over the snowy floor, he walked away as a portal opened and several giant spiders came crawling out of the portal. "It's a portal to the under dark, Have fun." He said, before disappearing into a cloud of black mist.

Harkon was about to go after him, misty step wouldn't have gotten him far but the spiders were heading toward the mine where several miners were watching the fight. He grabbed the first spider by it's eyes and crushed each of them one by one before his fingers cracked through it's carapace and he ripped it's skull off and brought his axe down on it's exposed innards. He tossed the creatures body into another spider, and slammed his axe into another, cutting it's abdomen off, and then stomped it's head. Pado rushed across the snow and stood on it's back legs to it's full twelve feet and let out a massive bellowing roar that instilled fear into the hearts of the weak, the spiders started rushing back to the portal. He watched the portal starting to grow slightly smaller by the second until it finally closed.

Harkon looked around, but the Spider mage was long gone, "I hate spell casters..." He muttered as he turned around seeing the miners looking at him, he turned back to Pado who was gnawing on one of their hairy legs, He sighed leading Pado to his sleigh, he wanted to go home, he was not in the mood to deal with assassins, and clearly they were not in the mood to deal with him either.