15. Transition
It took more than a month of grueling labor before our new home revealed its massive grandeur to the world. On the barren soil of the Levant, we'd laid a foundation of bedrock and erected a heavy stone wall twice the height of a man, encircling it like a fortress. Now, under the scorching April sun infused with the full bloom of spring, it stood proudly—as if defying the era itself.
The artisans who'd honed their skills shoulder-to-shoulder in the cramped old forge gathered before the enormous furnace with solemn expressions. Yet their eyes still brimmed with thick doubt and primal fear. They were tormented by the guilt of betraying the "order of craftsmen" passed down for centuries.
"This ain't the way of a true smith! How can you call yourself a blacksmith if you can't even feel the breath of the steel, just slaving away at one single process like some apprentice all day long!"
The roar old Ahmed had bellowed back when we were crammed together, teaching one by one due to space constraints, still rang in my ears. For these men, trapped their whole lives in the romantic delusion of crafting a masterpiece from ore selection to final sharpening with their own hands, my division of labor wasn't just about efficiency. To some, it was an assault forcing them to abandon an obsession bordering on compulsion.
But that noble stubbornness didn't last long. They had no choice but to swallow their complaints before my overwhelming display of skill, packaged as "training." Superior knowledge and technique held authority beyond question for them.
Real production was another matter entirely. Four days after the new factory's completion, the workshop was still pure chaos.
— Clang! Crack!
Steel screamed and shattered from all corners. Kids new to the standardized punching tools swung hammers clumsily, chipping their nails left and right. Even with the optimal alloy mix requiring precise temperature control, they'd quench haphazardly, ignoring it—and piles of glass-like shattered scrap plates grew mountainous.
— Thud!
And it wasn't just them. Even the man who'd come burning with vengeance wasn't spared. The hammer struck with a dull thud, but what returned wasn't a clear ring—it was a wretched crack.
"Again... damn it all to hell!"
Khalim, the man who'd lost everything and clung only to hatred, hurled his hammer to the floor. Fresh burn scars from that morning marred the back of his hand hideously.
A contagious sigh spread among the gathered newbie artisans.
"Master Barakah, the cooling water in Furnace 4 seems contaminated! The plates keep cracking!"
"Over here, the rivet holes don't match the blueprints at all! Even the chisel won't work!"
Screams mixed with pleas erupted from every direction, boiling my blood. I was feeling the factory foremen's plight deep in my bones here in 12th-century Levant. Some were tossing bone meal into the process, insisting it was an "ancestral secret." Others ignored my precisely calibrated gauges, drilling holes on "a craftsman's intuition" alone—so of course they didn't fit when measured later.
I circled the workstations, correcting their hands one by one like meshing misaligned gears. The factory's engines were still screeching like rusted machines without oil.
I approached Khalim, slumped in defeat, and picked up the cracking lump of scrap with tongs.
"Why'd you hammer there? It's way off the angle and position I taught you."
He ground his teeth. The eyes of the cynical man who'd lost his son and workshop filled with bloodshot fury.
"I've... hammered like that my whole life. That's how I was taught, and I believed it was a smith's skill and duty..."
"That's why it crumbles every time without change. Khalim, your duty isn't smashing steel—it's forging it along the path we demand."
I took the hammer myself. Once, twice. On the third strike, channeling thousands of ingrained repetitions plus mechanical precision, it pierced true. The ugly crack sealed like a lie.
The watching artisans gasped.
"See? Set your ego aside here. Put down that outdated 'learning' of yours. Follow my manual to the letter first. Variations come after you master your one share perfectly."
Khalim stared up blankly. Defeat washed from his eyes, replaced by a strange hunger. He gripped the hammer with trembling hands.
"...I'll try again. Your way this time."
I handed it back, clapping his shoulder. Soon, hammer strikes echoed anew. Not destruction this time—a clear, pure tone of steel hardening, growing.
The sublime moment Khalim's hands finally resonated with my blueprint—
The heavy iron gate groaned open violently.
"Barakah! Big trouble!"
Zaid burst in, panting. His face was pale, like someone facing disaster amid annoyance.
"The guild elders filed a formal complaint to Malik Duqaq's court! 'An unknown foreigner using devilish flames for forbidden sorcery, destroying market order.' Investigators and constables with soldiers are swarming outside the walls right now!"
Hammer sounds ebbed like a receding tide. Fear etched every face—Khalim's included. To these men crushed by power their whole lives, "constables" and "guild" were unstoppable acts of God.
The old era's massive authority now pressed on their new sanctuary.
"Master Barakah... how do we prove this isn't sorcery? If they storm in, we're done for."
I smiled coldly at Khalim's terrified voice. Disputes and corporate bullying were routine. Just more barbaric here—same essence.
"You don't prove anything. All responsibility for what we make here is mine."
I gazed toward the main gate beyond the ramparts, adding,
"Just keep hammering straight. I'll show them who dares extinguish this factory's fires."
I brushed soot from my clothes and strode to the gate— no longer a mere smith, but lord of this iron fortress.
Before the heavy gate, the dust-churning mob wore ornate official robes and silk-clad old schemers. Damascus Blacksmiths Guild elders. Aging hyenas guarding their turf against change.
"This the place? The freakish workshop where a heretic melts iron with sorcery to blind Malik?"
The lead elder faltered at the overwhelming heat, sulfur stench, and towering furnace—but bellowed anyway. Behind, constables' soldiers leveled spears threateningly inward.
The artisans' shoulders shrank visibly from the walls. I ascended the ramparts slowly, towering over them. My soot and sweat contrasted their smooth silks, radiating raw dominance.
"Sorcery? Elder, that's too much. This is a special production workshop for Damascus's defense, built under Malik's formal permit."
"Permit? Malik doesn't know you're wrecking market order with this grotesque vulgarity! One smith pouring his noble soul into a single sword—that's the law of this land! Chopping steel to stamp out junk defiles the sacred way of smithing!"
The constable unfurled a document, gripping it like proof of guild bribes.
"Extinguish all furnaces and halt operations until inspection! All blueprints and process records seized to guild HQ!"
Not inspection—tech theft, blatant plunder. No even pretending to take it to officials.
Like corporations, they aimed to crush and steal innovation under "law."
Despairing groans rose from the artisans. Zaid fidgeted beside me, whispering,
"Barakah, appease them first. Constables are Malik's proxies. Resist, and it's treason—heads roll!"
Unlike timid Zaid, my workshop filled his orders too, drawing big attention—proven by his border-guarding troops. I was hardened in ruthless business; I knew how to strike fear's core.
I locked eyes with the constable's wavering gaze, voice ice.
"Extinguish the fires? You mean that seriously?"
"Yes! Now!"
"Fine, Constable. But note this: the moment these furnaces die, delivery of dozens of Sirion armor sets to Malik's palace tomorrow becomes an issue. Will the elders here take responsibility—or you?"
Silence crashed. The constable's eyes quaked like an earthquake. "Malik's order" weighed too heavy for a petty official.
He hadn't even known—his reaction confirmed it.
"Wh-what? Malik ordered directly? Th-that's separate! Even if so, violating procedures...!"
"Procedures? You mean your 'procedures'? The slothful incompetence churning one suit of armor every fortnight? Or that your outdated customs outweigh Malik's haste to arm against Crusaders?"
My shout drained the official's face to dirt. Bribed by guild pennies, sure—but "Malik's authority" and "Crusader threat" shattered his will.
"No word games! Even Malik's order doesn't justify unverified foreign tricks soiling Damascus's honor with shoddy goods! We demand process and ledger inspection!"
Not what the now-compliant constable wanted—but the clueless elders' ploy. They meant to halt production under "inspection," missing deadlines.
"Lock me up and probe my tech if you like. But remember: when Malik sees empty wagons tomorrow morning, bet your necks survive. Shutting this gate defies his command—can you bear it?"
The constable now glared resentment at the elders. No fool to risk the gallows for pocket change, ignorant or not.
"M-misunderstanding! We just wanted to lightly check for sorcery! No intent to hinder Malik's supplies! We'll return later!"
He fled with troops through the gate. Stranded elders fumed, glaring murderously, but retreated.
In the storm's wake, artisans lifted heads. No more loser's grovel—their lifelong oppressor walls crumbling before logic and prowess. A first for them.
"What're you doing? When did I say stop hammering?"
My curt order unleashed a roar grander than before. Even defect-makers now burned with zeal, following my manual. Khalim wiped tears on his sleeve, hammering far more precise and fierce.
This was no mere job now. An inviolable home no power or custom could touch.
But I knew: just the start. Beyond the walls, crushers weren't petty merchants. Late April now. History's gears accelerated unstoppable. Constantinople's Crusader knights would soon cross seas to this soil. Desert maliks would sharpen blades crying jihad; their clash would pulverize Levant first.
Before era's flood, talent or pretexts were sandcastles. Thrash. No—grow massive enough to dam it. Untouched by spray.
If my weapons didn't sway history's course, I'd burst like a shrimp between war-whales.
I stared long at glowing steel. Today, guild. Tomorrow, bigger. I pushed today; soon the era pushes back.
One way: grow huge before crushed. Not ending at one workshop. Weapons. Supplies. Logistics. Capital. Stack them.
Before they notice, seize the board with iron and arms piled slow.
I laid steel atop the furnace flames.
No stopping now.