Chapter 482: Sweet Mouthed Tree Witch

The girls blinked, sniffling slightly with their angry murmurs dying down as they looked at the map.

"I cleared Mine XVIT intentionally," Eluned stated with conviction. "This particular deposit was an anomalous structural aberration... an impenetrable alloy that would have broken your tools and exhausted your stamina before midday. I removed the obstacle so we wouldn’t waste time!"

She pointed a pale elegant finger at the sprawling grid of the Umbral Basin.

"Look closely at the survey," Eluned continued, her eyes scanning the marks. "Blessed Land has roughly one hundred and forty-seven capable women under arms. More than a hundred of us were deployed across the basin this morning, divided into various extraction squads, while the rest remained behind to guard the walls and tend the keep. That means most sectors are completely empty right now!"

She tapped several distinct circles drawn across the northern and eastern ridges.

"Look at these nodes," Eluned urged, turning the parchment toward the women. "There are mines marked with an ’O’ for confirmed surface yields, and mines marked with an ’X’ that our scouts haven’t even touched yet and look at our golem!"

She gestured toward the massive Phase 1 construct.

"Our Lord entrusted us with a Phase 1 Titan Golem... the largest, most powerful transport engine in the entire territory! Mine XVIT was rich, but look at the bins! It is barely one-third full! Silas did not give us this titan expecting a single haul! If we return right now, we are wasting seventy percent of its capacity!"

A ripple of sudden realization passed through the crowd.

Eluned stepped forward, her voice swelling with inspiring seductive warmth.

"If we move right now... if we march across these unassigned sectors and strike three, four, perhaps five more caverns then every single one of you can fill your ledgers to overflowing! You won’t just match the other squads... you will dwarf them! When we roll back through the gates of Blessed Land at sunset, Lord Silas will not be looking at Tasmin’s little carts or Brida’s dented scrap! He will be looking at an entire mountain of treasure delivered by our hands and he will have no choice but to reward every single woman who swung a pick in this detachment!"

For a second, the girls stood frozen then, their eyes lit up with wild ambition.

"She’s right!" the blonde recruit gasped, pumping her pickaxe into the air. "The Titan has two more empty bins!"

"We can hit the iron crags at Sector Nine!"

"Let’s strip the whole basin bare!"

"To the wolves!"

A roaring unified cheer erupted from the squad, completely washing away the previous resentment.

The women scrambled toward their mounts, their boots churning the snow as they checked their straps with renewed energy.

Bodil rubbed her soot-stained chin, letting out an appreciative dwarven whistle.

"Well, stone me sideways... she’s not just a pretty face. That was smooth as oiled gears."

Beside her, Morwenna’s mouth opened and closed silently.

Her throat clicked with a dry frustrated hitch as she stared at the cheering girls as her glorious moment of mockery completely snatched from her grasp.

’Damn smooth-talking tree-witch,’ Morwenna scowled internally.

"Well?" Morwenna called out, clearing her throat aggressively and scowling at the eager women. "What are you standing around gaping for?! Pick a bloody mark on the map and let’s move before the blizzard swallows the tracks!"

"Sector Nine-B!" the vanguard girls shouted in unison. "The upper vein!"

"Then mount up!" Eluned commanded brightly, gracefully stepping onto the saddle of her Blessed Wolf. "Titan Golem, follow the vanguard column with full stride!"

CLANG-HISS!

The massive Phase 1 construct lurched forward, its four colossal stone legs falling into a steady movement behind the cavalry.

The ten women surged out into the howling wind, their wolf mounts bounding through the snowdrifts like silver phantoms.

As the column picked up speed, Morwenna kicked her mount into a gallop, pulling up directly alongside Eluned’s right flank.

The Pirate Queen leaned over her wolf’s neck, a bitter taunting smirk curling her lips as her messy hair whipped in the icy gale.

"Don’t think I didn’t see you sweating, light-weed," Morwenna mocked, raising her voice over the whistling storm. "You panicked and your little saintly mask cracked right down the middle. If I hadn’t kept my mouth shut, those girls would have fed your wooden staff to the forge fires..."

Eluned didn’t look flustered in the slightest.

She sat side-saddle with divine effortless poise, the wind somehow parting around her emerald robes without chilling her skin.

Slowly, she turned her head, fixing Morwenna with a breathtakingly serene gaze.

She reached out across the gap, placing one warm and perfectly manicured hand upon Morwenna’s leather-clad shoulder.

"I handled my flock as a shepherd should, Morwenna," Eluned murmured softly, her voice rich with mocking sweetness. "And unlike you, I am going to cash in on that reward tonight. Silas likes women who take care of his people..."

Morwenna’s brow furrowed, a suspicious growl catching in her throat.

"What’s that supposed to mean—"

Eluned leaned in slightly, her green eyes flashing with mischief.

"It means you are still a virgin, Hehe~" Eluned whispered smoothly, patting her shoulder twice with patronizing tenderness. "Come talk to me about men after you’ve finally lost it."

SWOOSH!

Eluned tapped the flank of her Blessed Wolf, and the divine beast surged forward with a sudden blinding burst of golden speed, leaving Morwenna eating a cloud of churned snow.

The violent draft whipped across Morwenna’s face, sending her hair swaying wildly in the freezing wind.

The Pirate Queen froze in the saddle, her jaw dropping and her eyes burning with a fury so apocalyptic it could have melted the northern glaciers.

Her cheeks turned an volcanic shade of purple-red.

"YOU... YOU ARROGANT, MOSS-COVERED WHORE!" Morwenna shrieked into the howling storm, drawing Tidebringer halfway from its sheath with a wild vibrating screech of steel! "I WILL CHOP YOU INTO KINDLING! I WILL BURN YOUR ROOTS FOR CHARCOAL! GET BACK HERE!"

She kicked her mount furiously, tearing through the snowdrifts in hot, murderous pursuit.

Meanwhile, far to the south, beneath the towering limestone ridges of the inner mountains, Cavern KB-22 was alive with the group in it.

Silas stood just inside the threshold of the hidden geode, letting out a long exasperated sigh.

"Haah..."

He reached down with both hands, aggressively tugging at the thick leather straps cinching across his ribcage.

He pulled the heavy iron buckle through the notch, grunting as the reinforced fabric snapped tightly against his chest, outlining the hard chiseled musculature of his torso like a second skin.

The territory’s tailor had done an exceptional job crafting the custom dwarven-tradition mining suits... complete with dense leather harnesses and fine steel-mesh underlays but the sizing was something else entirely.

Silas turned his head, casting a sharp dry look over his shoulder.

Standing beside an oversized tool crate was Thora.

The dwarven forge master was completely clean-faced, her skin soot-stained and pale eyes sparkling with shameless dwarven mirth as she adjusted her own gear.

"Thora," Silas muttered, his tone caught between deep irritation and amused disbelief. "Why in the hell is this uniform so tight around the groin and shoulders? I asked for flexible mining gear, not a corset."

Thora paused, her cheeks lighting up with an immediate radiant flush that had nothing to do with forge heat.

A wicked unrepentant smirk split across her clean-shaven face as she let her gaze shamelessly drop down the front of his trousers.

"Well, my Lord," Thora drawled, rolling her shoulders with a low chuckle, "when you’re hauling high-density earth ores, you need proper structural support for your vital assets! Wouldn’t want anything... swinging loose and getting crushed between two boulders, now would we? Besides, a tight fit keeps the blood flowing where a man needs it most!"

Silas stared at her for a flat deadpan second.

Without saying a single word, he stepped forward, raised his right hand, and snapped his index finger against the dwarven woman’s forehead with a crisp flick.

CLACK!

"Ow!" Thora yelped, clutching her forehead and hopping backward, though her grin remained completely intact. "Violence against your master smith! That’s a territorial crime, Lord Silas!"

"Keep your mind on the anvil, Thora," Silas rolled his eyes, adjusting the straps on his thighs one last time.

They were standing in the narrow concealed passage that the Princess had accidentally unlocked the previous afternoon.

Behind them, resting comfortably in the wide, cleared dome where the goblin settlement had once stood, the colossal Phase 1 Titan Golem lay flat on its belly, its massive reinforced alloy bins waiting patiently for the day’s extraction.

"Look at mine, my Lord!" Thora protested, pointing down at her own dark suit. "Mine’s tighter than a cellar door in a flood! See? The leather is pinching my ribs! It’s tradition, I tell you!"

Silas simply shook his head, focusing his attention forward as the rest of the extraction team gathered at the entrance of the dazzling geode.

Stepping out from behind a jagged stalagmite, having just finished fastening the final buckles of her mining harness, was Thor.

Silas’s eyes inadvertently locked onto the demigoddess, and for a split second, his breath caught in his throat.

The custom mining attire on a standard girl was striking, but on the God of Thunder, it was a visual catastrophe.

The tight, flexible stretch-fabric was strained to its microscopic limit across her towering, athletic frame.

The dark leather harness crossed over her gravity-defying chest, pushing her massive pale cleavage upward until it spilled shamelessly over the reinforced neckline.

Her sculpted abdominal muscles rippled beneath the dark mesh with every breath, and the tight leather trousers clung ruthlessly to her thick powerful thighs and hips.

’I have a feeling Thora has something to do with this...’

She carried herself with the wild confidence of an immortal warrior, her long blonde hair tied back in a messy warrior’s knot.

Silas immediately cleared his throat, violently snapping his gaze to the left to stare intently at a completely unremarkable patch of gray limestone.

"GWAHAHAHAHA!" Thor’s booming, thunderous laughter echoed off the high crystalline ceiling, shaking loose a shower of sparkling dust.

She caught Silas’s sudden flustered evasion instantly.

Striding forward with massive confident steps, she planted her heavy hands on her hips, thrusting her chest out proudly as she leaned down toward him.

"What’s the matter, Lord?!" Thor teased, her storm-blue eyes flashing with playful mirth. "Does the armor of the mountain make you nervous? I thought you mortal kings were fond of bountiful harvests! I am glad to see you appreciate the divine proportions of Asgard! Look all you wish... a great warrior should never hide her strength!"

Standing barely five paces away, the Princess slowly looked down at her own chest.

The twenty-five-year-old royal maiden was wearing the exact same custom-tailored leather harness.

The straps fit her slender elegant frame perfectly, accentuating her narrow waist and the modest delicate curve of her bosom.

She was not flat by any normal mortal metric since her royal upbringing had blessed her with a graceful shapely figure.

Yet, as she looked at her own chest, and then looked up at Thor’s armor-straining twin peaks, the Princess’s expression withered into a look of soul-crushing despair.

’...I might as well be an ironing board,’ the Princess thought miserably, her azure hair drooping around her flushed cheeks as she crossed her arms over her chest, trying desperately to hide her modest curves. ’How is that physically possible? Does divine food go straight to the ribs?’

"A warrior’s worth is measured by her purity and discipline, not her excess mass, Princess," a soft tranquil voice chimed gently.

Stepping into the light of the Mana Diamonds was Aurelia.

The former Saintess of the Argent Flame looked breathtakingly magnificent.

Even in the tight, dark leather of dwarven mining gear, Aurelia carried an aura of untouchable elegance.

The dark straps contrasted starkly against her pale porcelain skin, framing her toned shoulders and slender collarbones with razor-sharp perfection.

Her golden eyes sparkled with serene warmth, and her pristine white under-tunic glowed under the mana of the cavern.

Beside her, Vala and Reina were adjusting their thigh sheaths.

Vala’s dark shadowed presence was sharp as a sword with her tight gear accentuating her lean physique, while Reina’s athletic wolf-riding frame was much fuller.

Silas took a deep breath, forcing his composure back into place.

He clapped his hands together, the sharp crack echoing off the shimmering walls of the geode.

"Alright, that’s enough posturing," Silas announced, his voice carrying the firm weight of command. "We have thousands of tons of high-grade Mana Diamonds to extract, and we have a schedule to keep... Thora, gather everyone around. It’s time for your demonstration."