Blastmaster 3000

Blastmaster 3000 sits on the workbench, a coppery cylinder bound in brass ribs, its surface pitted from years of fieldwork yet gleaming where a careful hand has lacquered the edges. A glass gauge bulges at the side, catching a flame and painting a faint blue halo around a coil of blackened wire. Leather straps, worn smooth by fingers and rope, loop from the grip, and a switch-tap on top clicks when you nudge it, as if the device itself is listening. The markings etched along the barrel—tiny runes, alchemical sigils, and a name that repeats in commercial whispers—speak of a maker who fused craft with a bit of reckless curiosity. In the right light, it resembles a stubborn lantern that decided to grow teeth. Legends say this model was born in a workshop where heat and powder danced, designed to harness a small, contained blast that could punch through shielded hides without dragging the wielder into the vortex of the explosion. In practice, it is both tool and talisman: a modular blast emitter that can be loaded with charged charges, calibrated for distance, and detonated with a measured squeeze, then followed by a secondary shock that rattles through stone and bone alike. When the trigger is pulled, a hollow whistle escapes, the brass shudders, and a clean, contained bloom erupts in a ring of flame and rain, throwing enemies back as if the air itself had learned to recoil. Engineers call it a “delicate escalation”—a device that rewards patience and precise timing rather than raw bravado. The device thrives in tunnels, on cliff edges, near chiseled ruins where a misstep is fatal yet a well-placed blast can open a doorway not even a ladder could reach. And yet the story of Blastmaster 3000 is not only about combat; it threads through markets and caravans, trade routes and salvage plots. I found it one dawn beside a stack of crates on the jetty, priced in the pocketed pages of Saddlebag Exchange, where vendors ink deals with capped quills and quick hands. A collector priced it at around 3 gold, 50 silver—a sum that buys more than a fuse and a dream; it buys a reputation, a warning, a chance to tilt the odds in a tight fight. The buyer would walk away with the instrument, a handful of explosive cells, and a map scribbled with where to stash charges for maximum effect. In my travels, I have watched the Blastmaster become a quiet partner—an engineer’s faithful companion during sieges, a field accessory for scouting and fortification, a way to pry open ancient vaults without wrecking the memory of those who once guarded them. To wield it is to tell a story of partnerships—between metal, powder, and the stubborn will to make something out of ruin. The Blastmaster 3000 is not merely a tool of damage; it is a link to a line of tinkers who believed that a little knowledge, a patient hand, and a fearless eye could turn a ruin into a route, a route into a road, and a road into a way forward for whoever walks with it, shoulder to shoulder, into the thicket of the world.