Kat offered Grace a hand, then pulled her to her feet. Grace promptly dusted off the excess snow and then looked suspiciously at the Timmy's who seemed to be snickering, though of course no sound came out.
"So, you missed the tape, but basically, we get one weapon each, and we can pick whichever one we want, but the four best are at the back. If we do pick one of the four though the other person can't grab it… does that make sense?" said Kat
"Yeah I think so. Do you know what the big four are?" asked Grace
"Nope, we can go check them out together" said Kat.
Kat lead the way deeper into the weapons vault. Mostly ignoring the increasingly large variety of weapons. After a full minute of walking it became clear this was the right decision, as they'd already walked past hundreds if not thousands in that minute alone.
All in all it took Kat and Grace another 3 minutes to actually reach the back, and by now Kat was debating if the weapons lining the all could even be counted as such. Kat was pretty sure she saw a barstool on one of the weapon racks, opposite a double-bladed butchers cleaver.
Approaching the last four weapons, Kat examined them closely but didn't immediately notice anything that set them apart from one another. On the wall there was a bow, a spear, a shield and a whip. They didn't seem all that strong compared to the rest of the weapons and compared to the strangeness they'd just walked through these seemed pretty tame by comparison.
That was until they read out the names. The bow was called the Great Sword of Azgaren, the spear was called the Lightning Rod, the shield was, the Ancient Bulwark, and finally the whip was the Blood Drinker.
"These are the best weapons Thyme has?" Kat asked confused
"You can't feel the power emanating from these weapons?" asked Grace "I can already tell that each is packed with as many enchantments as their materials could possibly allow, and that isn't because the materials are bad, they seem to be great quality"
"Yeah but why is the bow a greatsword?" asked Kat
"Um…" Grace stumbled at this "I don't know?"
"Are you telling me you don't know or asking me?" said Kat
"Telling, I'm telling you I don't know" said Grace
"Well, in that case" said Kat gesturing to the Timmy's "Have at it"
The Timmy's first went up to the bow and pulled out a cassette from behind the plaque. Moving back over to the wall and inserting it, Thyme's voice rang out "Hello, this is the tape for the Great Sword of Azgaren, if you aren't seeing that weapon around, please choose a different tape.
"Now, I'm sure I know your first question, this is a bow, why is it a great sword? Well, that's because it was made by my old friend and master weaponsmith Azgaren. He has made some of the greatest weapons to ever grace this land
"Of course, all his skill and he still has such shit naming sense, excuse the language. I mean really, why did you call this a sword? Well it's because he enchanted it to cut through anything… and then crazy thing is he got really close
"It can't quite cut through 'anything' but it might as well. This means of course, the main problem with it is also that it can cut through anything, because that includes your hand. See, normally you just enchant the blade with enhanced cutting and call it a day
"But not ol' Azgaren no… he said to me 'what if the whole weapon could cut' and I of course told him 'that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard let's make it' and sure it was fun the first few times you cut your fingers off, but it becomes a pain to regrow them all the time.
"So, ah, yeah, come grab your extra sharp bow, and know that I'm not responsible for any damages you do to yourself"
Kat and Grace shared an awkward look. "I say neither of us pick that" said Grace
"Agreed" said Kat
Grace's eyes flicked towards Kat for just a moment before returning to the weapons. "What?" asked Kat who noticed the movement
"I was, ah, just half expecting those chains again" said Grace
"Well, they seem to know their place really. That wasn't a formal agreement between us, it was acknowledging neither of us want this death trap of a weapon. Imagine if they popped up all the time in casual conversation, that would be horrible" said Kat
"I suppose" said Grace nodding towards Timmy so they'd put in the next tape.
"Hello hello, this next item… um actually what order did I put these in again? Eh doesn't matter. This next item is 'the lightning rod' this was also made by Azgaren, if you've heard of him. A great friend, and a better blacksmith though he couldn't name anything well.
"At least the name is accurate this time. This particular beauty is called the lightning rod for a reason. It summons down a powerful strike of lightning upon it's target… pretty much whenever it wants.
"See, we never could figure out what triggers it to go off. The lightning is powerful, much more so then the materials should allow, but it's propensity to repeatedly strike it's owner has led to it ending up in my care. Azgaren isn't particularly lightning proof and after it broke the roof of his workshop for the third time he gave up on using it personally
"Which is a shame, I used it to roast some horrible people during the battle of Galangalen. I mean sure, I handed the spear out to random troops and I never exactly wieleded it myself… and those troops I gave it to were the enemy, but by all accounts it won the battle for us.
"So what do you say? In for a shocking time?" The recording ended and Kat could see Grace clutching her head in mock pain.
"Why? Who is this Azgaren guy and why does he keep making this shit?" asked Grace "Just make a normal weapon. These are all so unbelievably powerful, but you made them useless"
"Well, would Thyme really be handing them out if they were actually good?" asked Kat
Grace nodded and sighed before gesturing for the next tape "Perhaps this one will be better"
"Ladies and Gentlemen… or wait isn't there only one of you? Never mind let's start again. Lady and or Gentleman I present to you the Ancient Bulwark. Now this is actually a legendary item from the first war. I mean, I didn't get it there, found it in an attic I helped a friend clean, but that is beside the point
"This here, is one of the few weapons in existence that can permanently increase the power of it's user over time… that is if you consider turning to titanium a positive. You see, the original owner of the weapon was actually a steel elemental and had the thing created to try and increase its overall strength.
"And the shield itself is very sturdy, can block nearly anything really with only a few limitations like a certain 'sword' a friend of mine made. Nonetheless do be careful, it turns everything to titanium, including your muscles and skin. If you don't have metal manipulation I'd probably skip this one.
"Just roll the last one Timmy" said Kat already not looking forward to the last one.
"Greetings, my name is Thyme and today I'll be introducing my good friend Blood Drinker. Blood Drinker say hello to the fans"
"Well, sure be like that then. This lovely young lady is called Blood Drinker, and now, you might be wondering why I refer to a weapon as a lady… well, it may or may not have an ancient vengeful spirit inside but don't worry about that she's really sweet once you get to know her.
"I mean sure, she requires a couple bodies worth of blood on a good day and a hell of a lot more on a bad one, but focus on the positives, like the fact that you can control the whip with your mind. Cool right?
"Plus I mean, doesn't have to be your blood. It could be anyone's blood. Personally I like to feed her bloodroot sap instead. Now granted, that isn't actually blood, but she's never complained once… though I did scare her terribly that one time I punched a dragon halfway across the continent by reflex… so perhaps she doesn't have the heart to complain."
Kat slapped her palm into her face and slowly dragged it down. "Grace… I think we should look at the other weapons"
The elf nodded enthusiastically along with Kat desiring nothing more then pretend they hadn't just wasted several precious minutes listening to Thyme speak about his most 'powerful' weapons.