Ziggurat

"What are you doing with your hands, Exile?" Time's silent and careful words brought my mind back to reality. Because of it, I instinctively folded my fingers into a fist; the screen continued to show a bird's eye view of the horde and the rocky terrain.

"Err... Nothing, nothing!" I chuckled while waving my hands with a troubled expression. "I'm just uhh... fooling around! Look, ow, ow, ow!" I barked while mimicking how dogs' mouth moves with my hands; this kinda messed up with the ZOOM screen, inching closer and going farther on and on continuously as my fingers moved.

Times grumbled and looked away at me again while the soldier beside him looked at me with eyes filled with discontent and disgust.

'This guy is already getting on my nerves...'

'Is it my fault your finger commands look fucking silly?'

'Don't bring my mom into this, you fucking asshole. And you curse harder than me, cunt.'

I sighed and shaped my hand like a dog again; only then did the ZOOM screen finally return to its default look. There, I saw the kapre I was surveying; he's starting to create a new and still piping red sword. I moved my middle finger and ring finger away from my thumb for a few centimeters and saw two other kapres right beside the one I was observing closely. It seemed like the first one is melting the raw materials, the second is hammering the weapon, and the last is finishing it up.

'They move fast.'

'I bet. These soldiers would be unusable after all these non-stop work, but it didn't look like any of them are as drained as we would have expected.'

'Do you know what they're wearing, Dominion?'

'They're using leaves as armor?'

'Hmm... Damn. Looks like I'll be on an ANALYZE spree once we're done with this war.'

'But Times still looks worried.'

'Dominion.'

'I think I know what their trump card is now...'

'Look there.'

I focused my gaze on the gigantic structure on the ground as well as the kapre sitting on a throne above it.

"ZOOM 2," I uttered the command, and a second ZOOM screen popped below the already existing one on the upper right corner of my vision.

As we flew above the structure I've detected, the hot air balloon raised higher into the air; it must have been because the Vyurborne soldier did something with the heat. There's a visible nervousness in his expression, but once we've flown high enough, the soldier let out a sigh of relief and continued glaring at me again. The fuck is this guy's problem anyway? Is he asking for a beating or something?

Whatever. I just focused my attention on the familiar structure below; thankfully, I managed to capture the damn thing on the ZOOM 2 screen. When I looked at the two screens, I realized something new with them. Each now had small blue texts written above them. The ZOOM screen that showed the kapre blacksmith now had the words ZOOM 1 above it, while the other one that displayed the enormous structure had the text ZOOM 2 instead.

'Good to know.'

"CHANGE ZOOM 2," I whispered, and immediately, the text at the top of the second ZOOM screen glowed.

"Ziggurat." With my whisper, the glowing name on the second screen disappeared and immediately changed into Ziggurat.

Dominion was right; it's the most fitting name for that structure.

A towering pyramid-like structure, imposing staircases on each of the structure's four sides with innumerable steps, and a raised platform at the very top with a gigantic throne made out of wood, stone, and metal, there's no better name to call this marvelous architectural wonder other than ziggurat. I had seen many similar structures in the Vitality God Throne's domain in Firmament beside the endless floating rivers connecting his domain to others; the only difference was that Throne's ziggurats are made of diamonds and pearls. My question now is how does the kapres learn how to make such an impressive copy of Throne's signature structure?

Is it because of that man sitting on the throne above the stone ziggurat?

I looked at his appearance from the second ZOOM screen: a crown made of brambles and bones, a bloodied body much larger than any of the other kapres, and the same violet light armor with countless wooden and vine ornaments dangling on his neck. The man on the throne is screaming orders from above his ziggurat with a whip in hand. He was pointing and shouting orders to the servants at the foot of his ziggurat. His voice was loud enough that I could hear glimpses of it even from a few hundred meters above.