The morning, golden and silent, dressed itself in an excessive serenity—the kind that usually precedes the shattering of the world.
Ruitan was no longer just a name on a map or an order from the Queen; it was a hungry shadow occupying every crevice of my subconscious, a destiny I couldn't ignore. Lavinsk felt like a refuge about to be left behind, soon to be replaced by the uncertainty of a planet I had never stepped foot on.
In my room, the silence was broken only by the creaking of wood beneath my weight.
I sat on the floor, my muscles still carrying the lingering exhaustion of training. The dawn light flooded the room, highlighting the silhouette of Lucas's spear. It stood there, leaning against the wall—an artifact of dark steel and brutal history that, for months, had been my only answer to death.
My eyes traced the dark shaft, but my mind rejected the image.
I was seeing something else.
Where the cold metal of the spear stood, I sought the memory of a blade—the direct cut, the symmetry, the lightness my wrist demanded. My soul yearned for the dance of the blade, for something that finally felt like an extension of my own will.
The knock on the door was subtle, a rhythmic tap that broke the bubble of my introspection. I didn't rush to answer; I simply let the silence stretch, savoring the final seconds of a thought I knew was about to alter my destiny.
"Suki," Kânia's voice was almost a whisper, though she stood right at the threshold. She moved with her usual ethereal grace, her light clothes undulating with every step. Seeing my gaze locked onto the spear, she leaned against the wall and crossed her arms. "You always do that when you're thinking too much. Staring at the sky or freezing in place... it looks like you're trying to converse with your weapons."
I let out a small, tired laugh. "I feel... like it doesn't belong to me anymore."
Kânia sat beside me on the floor. Her eyes drifted to the spear, her voice dropping, becoming firm and serene. "That spear was a gift, a legacy, a symbol of respect. But it doesn't define who you are, Suki."
I lowered my gaze. "I feel good fighting with it. But when I'm in the heat of battle, my soul gets lost. It's as if a sword would be a more natural extension of myself."
Kânia studied me intently before gently pressing two fingers against my chest.
"You are growing. And when we grow, we change. It's not about abandoning the spear. It's about allowing yourself to evolve—to choose your own form. That weapon brought you this far, but maybe now... it's time to listen to your heart again."
"Is it wrong to want to leave such an important weapon behind?" I asked.
"No," she said, a faint smile gracing her lips. "What is wrong is forcing yourself to carry something out of obligation when your soul clamors for something else. Whether it's a sword, a spear, or your bare hands, a weapon is only useful if it reflects who you truly are."
"And the sword always accompanied you, right?"
I remembered playing with my friends in the village courtyard, my training with Silver on that planet, and the tournament.
I looked at the spear one last time before standing up. Walking over to a low shelf, I placed it down with the reverence one gives to a sacred relic.
"Then it's decided," I breathed out heavily. "I want a sword. Not just any blade... *my* blade."
Kânia nodded. "Talk to Silver. He will understand. And if you forge it yourself... it will have a soul."
Putting away the spear felt like the first full breath I had taken in a long time. Now, the emptiness in my hand needed to be filled with something new. Something mine.
I left the room with a single goal in mind: find Silver.
I bounded down the marble steps three at a time and bolted straight to the grassy courtyard. Empty. I ran through the dining room, down the corridors of the training wing, slammed open the heavy oak doors of the library, and searched all the way to the outer balconies. Nothing. The platinum god seemed to have evaporated.
I returned to the back of the estate, panting, trying to focus my senses. Before I could decide where to go next, a lethal displacement of air tore through the space right above my head.
I rolled to the side by pure instinct the exact millisecond a silver arc descended, slamming five sharp talons deep into the dirt where I had been standing.
"Distracted so early in the morning?" Laura teased. Her crimson eyes gleamed with wild excitement as she spun her body, immediately launching a roundhouse kick aimed straight at my ribs.
I leaned my torso back, feeling the wind of the blow graze my chin, and countered by blasting a gust of compressed air from my palms straight into her chest to force her back.
"Laura, not now! I need to find the Master!" I growled, quickly getting back on my feet.
She landed with feline grace, retracting her claws with a metallic click.
**SNIKT.**
She let out a scoffing, smug laugh. "You're no fun when you're in a hurry. And I haven't seen the old man today. Good luck."
I ignored the provocation and looked up. The golden sky of Lavinsk shone mercilessly.
*Of course,* I thought. *He must be at the floating arena.*
I took a deep breath, activating my **Wind Transformation**.
Luminous lines cut across my skin, and I launched myself off the ground like a missile. I tore through the thick layer of clouds and landed heavily on the shattered marble of the floating archipelago.
Only the biting wind and the cold vacuum greeted me; the main platform was deserted. Cosmic dust swirled alone in the vastness of the craters left from our last fight.
"Dammit! Where the hell is he?!" I yelled, my frustration boiling over.
Without hesitating, I threw myself off the edge of the platform, letting gravity pull me into a free fall back to the surface. I crashed onto the mansion's lawn, scattering dead leaves, and marched back inside, stomping my dirty boots on the floor.
As I crossed the threshold into the living room, I stopped dead in my tracks.
Kânia was sitting at the immense oak table. The morning light reflected off the flawless steel of a set of kitchen knives she was calmly polishing with a fine silk cloth. Her posture was the perfect picture of serenity, completely detached from my chaos.
"Kânia!" I exclaimed, my breath still ragged. "Have you seen Silver? I've looked through the whole house, the courtyard, corridors, fought with Laura, and even flew up to the clouds! He's just vanished!"
The goddess paused her polishing. She raised her warm, brown eyes to me, and a soft, crystalline laugh escaped her lips.
"Ah, Suki... I told him early this morning about your decision to forge something new." She slid the cloth down the blade with calculated slowness. "He's probably already at the forge. Waiting for you."
My blood ran cold.
The realization hit my stomach like a lead block. I had been running around like an idiot for hours. *Hours.*
"Waiting? Since sunrise?!" The panic made my voice pitch a whole octave higher. Making the most impatient, lethal god in the universe wait for me was practically a death sentence. "Where is this forge?!"
Kânia smiled, finding amusement in my panic, and pointed the gleaming tip of the knife toward the open window facing the back of the property.
"Go straight through the grassy courtyard until the very end. You'll see a stone hill with a hidden cave at the top. That's his sanctuary. Crafting weapons has always been a personal hobby of your master."
I didn't wait for her to finish. I shouted a quick thank you and, before even crossing the threshold out to the yard, I clenched my fists and ignited my core.
But I didn't invoke the wind.
The gravity around me seemed to double. Thick, dark-green and golden stripes, resembling veins of cooling magma, tore across the skin of my arms and legs, pulsing with an ancient, heavy energy. The marble floor of the veranda groaned and cracked beneath my boots.
I didn't run across the grassy courtyard; I crushed it.
With every stride I took, my **Earth Transformation** responded to my instincts in fractions of a second. Millimeters before my sole touched the ground, small pillars of raw stone erupted violently from the earth, slamming against my heels. I used these sudden rocky ridges as massive springboards, the telluric energy catapulting me forward in absurd horizontal bounds.
Silver's perfect lawn was shredded, leaving a chaotic trail of craters and overturned earth in my wake as I swallowed the distance to the mountain in the blink of an eye.
Reaching the foot of the hill, I was faced with a steep, vertical wall of stone. I didn't hesitate, nor did I slow down. I slammed both heels into the ground with seismic force, halting my body's immense inertia all at once. Bending my knees, I drove a brutal charge of my aura directly into the geological faults below.
The ground roared.
A dull, gutural rumble shook the mountain's foundations, and a colossal pillar of solid rock exploded beneath my feet.
The column hoisted me vertically at a breathtaking speed, tearing through the air and scraping the mountainside in an uninterrupted ascent. The pillar braked as abruptly as it had risen, aligning perfectly with the edge of an upper plateau.
I leaped from the stone platform mid-air, landing heavily on both feet, kicking up a thick cloud of dust as I skidded to a halt at the entrance of the hidden cave.
The dark green energy receded beneath my skin the moment I stood up, panting. The rock dust slowly settled around me, and the crisp, cold air of the high altitude was instantly swallowed by an suffocating heat and the dense smell of ancient soot and molten metal.
I wiped the dirt from my face and stared into the interior of the forge.
The god was already there.
"You are extraordinarily late," Silver commented, his polished voice echoing against the rocky walls. A cynical smirk widened across his face as he watched the dust settle and evaluated the wreckage I had just caused. "And you made a completely unnecessary mess of my lawn."
I rested my hands on my knees, drawing the hot, soot-heavy air into my lungs before managing to straighten up.
"I looked for you through the entire house," I shot back, my voice coming out between frustrated gasps as I brushed the stone dust from my clothes. "I searched the living room, the courtyard, the hallways, fought Laura, and even flew up to the cloud arena! How was I supposed to guess you've been buried inside a mountain since before sunrise?"
*He knew exactly that I was going to run around the property like an idiot,* I thought, grinding my teeth as a drop of sweat rolled down and stung my eye.
Silver let out a low chuckle, amused by my breathless indignation. But I wasn't there to argue about my stamina or the time.
I clenched my fists, forcing my body to ignore the exhaustion of the sprint. The frustration evaporated, instantly replaced by the undeniable urgency burning in my chest. I locked eyes with my master's green gaze, refusing to back down a single millimeter.
"I want..." I began, my voice losing its complaining edge and gaining the gravity of an absolute decision. "I need to forge my sword."
Silver fell silent for a single heartbeat. He stopped smiling. His predatory gaze drifted down to my dirty boots, passed over my hands still vibrating with adrenaline, and locked onto the depths of my eyes, measuring and testing the raw conviction I exuded.
Slowly, the platinum god uncrossed his arms and turned around, walking toward the dense heat pulsing from the depths of the cave.
"Then enter," his deep voice resonated, blending with the heavy crackle of ancient embers within. "And show me who you are now."
The workshop was a cross between a sanctuary and a furnace. Crystals glowed along the walls, and ancient tools floated lazily above magical racks.
"You make weapons too?" I asked, letting my eyes wander over the blades hanging from the rocky walls.
"Just a hobby... a habit I picked up from my master."
I stopped walking immediately.
"From your... master?" The words escaped my mouth in a low, stunned tone. I spun on my heels to face him, blinking a few times to process the information. The image of Silver—the untouchable, absolute, and feared god of Lavinsk—bowing his head to receive orders from someone else felt like a complete glitch in the universe's logic.
Silver stopped beside a worn anvil. He picked up a heavy pair of iron tongs, flipping the tool in his calloused hands, and let out a deep laugh that echoed through the cavern.
"Do you really think I was born knowing everything I know, kid?" He raised an eyebrow, an ironic and nostalgic glint crossing his green iris. "Do you think the strength I possess spawned from a void, without someone taking the trouble to grind me down to the bone first?"
The platinum god walked slowly to the base of the unlit forge, running his fingertips over the porous, black stone. The cynical smirk vanished from his face, replaced by a shadow of ancestral respect.
"She was a true demon," he murmured, his voice dropping a register, heavy with the weight of millennia. "In all her existence, she only ever accepted three disciples, and she tested us beyond the brink of insanity every single day. Our training had no set end time; it only stopped when our bodies collapsed or... when she finally grew bored of watching us bleed."
While Silver spoke, I began walking along the perimeter of the cave. The air inside smelled of stardust and ancient metal. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of weapons lined the space.
"But no matter how terrible the carnage was outside," Silver continued, looking into the empty hearth of the forge as if he could still see the flames dancing, "the moment training ended, her workshop came to life. She would light the fire and begin hammering steel. And she taught me that the weapons she forged weren't made for war."
Silver raised his eyes to the crystal-studded ceiling of the cave.
"It was her way of coping with time. She taught me that hot metal has a soul. That folding steel is a brutal, painful, and indestructible way of preserving moments. Days of fury, nights of mourning, and even rare days of peace... she forged every single one of those emotions and carved a name into the base of the metal. When I was just an arrogant, tired, broken brat, I would sit in that exact corner over there and just watch, fascinated, reading the names and histories on every blade she hung on the wall."
I continued walking through the shadows of the cave, feeling a cold shiver run up my spine. The walls were lined. From floor to ceiling.
*Memories...* I thought, my stomach dropping slightly. *This place isn't an arsenal. It's a vault. It's the story of his life. Every weapon is a piece of what he lived through.*
I stopped before a stone display rack on the left. My fingers brushed the hilt of a longsword with an incredibly slender, elegant, and stark white blade. A thin layer of dust rested on the guard; I tilted my head and wiped the base of the blade with my thumb.
Carved into the cold steel, in graceful and precise lettering, lay a single name.
*Agnes.*
The name sounded completely foreign to me, but the weapon's shape and visual lightness conveyed a profound melancholy, a near-reverent care from whoever had forged it. It didn't look made to kill, but to remember.
I took a slow step back, absorbing the heavy, silent atmosphere of the place, and my back ended up bumping against the central display structure of the cave. The dull impact made the frame shudder, and a colossal weapon swayed on the dark rack behind me.
I turned my head quickly.
It was a titanic halberd. The metal was raw, dark, and tempestuous, forged with a chaotic aggressiveness that seemed to exude danger even while inert. The shaft was stained and heavily scarred.
I lowered my eyes to the weapon's black iron shaft. There, scratched into the metal with violent, angry force—as if the blacksmith wanted to punish the weapon itself during the forging—was a second name.
*Lysander.*
Another ghost name. I didn't have the slightest clue who Agnes or Lysander were, but the brutal contrast between the silver sword and the twisted halberd told a story that bypassed words. People who had passed through Silver's life, who had fought alongside him or against him, leaving indelible marks. I stood there, surrounded by those echoes of steel, realizing for the first time the true scale of the ocean of time, pain, and loss my master carried in absolute silence.
Silver turned around slowly, snapping me out of my trance. He shoved his hands into his pants pockets, his posture returning to that of the usual untouchable god, and gave me an evaluative look.
"Well?" he asked, breaking the sepulchral tension of the cave. "Do you actually have your materials, or did you just come here to stare at my wall?"
I swallowed hard, shaking my head slightly to force my mind back to the present. I pushed away the weight of those unknown names, though the strangeness of Silver's memories still hung in the air. Instead of reaching into my pockets for something, I placed my hand over my chest, where the warmth of my own energy pulsed steadily beneath my tunic.
"Silver," I called out, my voice echoing firmly against the stone walls. "Kânia told me that a weapon is nothing more than a cold piece of metal unless it carries an essence. She said that what truly gives the edge, what defines the trajectory, is the soul of the one wielding it."
"And you think you have a soul ready to be forged, Suki?"
I closed my hand, feeling the energy of my transformation tingle beneath my skin. I raised it, not reaching for rare stones or crystals, but revealing what I had carried with me since the day I survived that hell in my birth village.
"I don't need rare stones or crystals," I said, the firmness in my tone silencing the crackle of the forge. "The strongest thing I have, the only thing that truly matters outside of my determination... is this right here."
I pointed to my own veins, where the glow of my lineage ran like a river of mercury.
"My blood. My lineage."
The silence that followed was absolute.
Silver didn't laugh. He didn't scoff.
He stepped closer, and for the first time, I saw something bordering on reverence in that god's eyes. He extended his hand, not to test or attack me, but to feel the pulsation of the energy I carried.
"You want to fuse your very being into the metal?"
"I want this blade to be inseparable from me," I answered, holding his gaze. "If a weapon is an extension of the soul, like you said... then I want it to be made of the only thing that is truly mine."
Silver nodded just once—a slow, solemn movement. He turned to the ancestral forge and, with a simple gesture, caused the black stones at the base to open, revealing a cradle of molten metal, pure and virgin, waiting for an essence to give it life.
"Then step forward," he commanded, his voice now carrying a power that made the entire cavern vibrate. "If your blood is the sacrifice you've chosen, then prepare yourself. What we are going to create here is not just a sword."
"It is your own soul."
### Day 1: The Form
By midday, the heat of the forge already had sweat pouring down my neck, dripping onto the black stone floor. Silver didn't hand me a hammer or tell me to light the fire immediately. Instead, he tossed a heavy, smooth slab of slate at my feet, followed by a piece of dark charcoal.
"Before you bleed over the metal, your mind needs to know what it's creating," Silver ordered, leaning against the cave wall with his arms crossed, his green eyes assessing every twitch of my muscles. "Draw and assemble what your soul craves."
I knelt before the slab. My hand trembled slightly as I recalled the weight of the ordinary steel that had shattered in the monster's jaws, and the crushing might of Kimiko's axe. Pulled by that trauma, the charcoal slid across the stone. I traced a thick, wide blade—a true greatsword, built to withstand any impact without breaking.
When I finished, I looked up, expecting approval.
Silver walked over to the slab, stared at the drawing for a single second, and with the sole of his boot, rubbed the slate, erasing the brutal outline in a cloud of black dust.
"You are drawing your fear," his voice cut through the crackling embers, sharp and merciless. "You are forging a shield disguised as a blade because you still fear being crushed. If you try to swing a chunk of iron that thick, your speed dies."
I swallowed hard, frustration burning right alongside the heat of the forge. He kicked the charcoal back to me.
"Remember how your body moves when death is millimeters from your neck."
I stood up. The air in the cave was thick, but I forced my lungs to find a rhythm. *How do I move?*
The image of my white aura exploded in my mind—the fluid agility that tore through the clouds of Lavinsk. The ability to glide between blows like an invisible breeze. But right beneath that lay the density, the absolute anchoring of the earth.
The charcoal met the stone again, but this time, my hand did not hesitate. The strokes weren't guided by trauma, but by my own breath.
I drew a double-edged longsword. The base of the blade, near the guard, was slightly thicker and more robust, engineered to absorb colossal impacts and anchor weight—the heritage of Earth. However, as the blade extended, it tapered into an aerodynamic and lethally elegant profile. Down the center of the steel, I traced a deep fuller, designed not just to alleviate weight, but to channel air.
A weapon designed to whistle the song of the wind before decapitating its target.
I let the charcoal drop to the floor. The silence in the cave stretched as Silver observed the black powder on the slate.
The platinum god squatted down slowly. He traced the imaginary line of the sword's edge with his index finger in the air, calculating the center of gravity, weight distribution, and the design's lethality. When he looked up, his usual cynicism had evaporated. There was a frosty respect in those ancient eyes.
"Form has never been a matter of aesthetics, Suki," Silver murmured, his voice resonating with the gravity of an oath. "The weight of a weapon dictates how you step; the curve of the steel dictates how you breathe. What you've drawn here... is not a piece of metal."
He stood up, his eyes locked onto mine. "It is something adaptive, just like you."
Silver pointed to the sleeping forge behind him. "The foundation is ready. Now, let's give it weight."
### Day 2: Fire and Blood
The second day began before the suns of Lavinsk even thought about breaking the horizon. The air was still heavy with the biting frost of dawn when I met Silver in the mansion's main corridor. He didn't say a single word; he just gave a sharp nod toward the back door.
As we crossed the dew-covered courtyard, the veranda door creaked slightly. Laura was there, leaning against the frame, rubbing one of her red eyes with the back of her hand. Her black hair was perfectly chaotic, resembling a nest of crows.
"Where are you two weirdos going before breakfast?" she rasped, her voice dragged out and hoarse from sleep. "The training yard is this way, in case the old man forgot."
"Business," Silver replied, without breaking stride or looking back. "Find something useful to do with your aggression today."
Laura huffed, crossing her slender arms and rolling her eyes with a pout. "Whatever. I'll see if Lady Kânia wants to give me a morning beating. At least she doesn't make me wake up in the dark." She turned around, already cracking her knuckles and stretching her shoulders, walking back inside, ready to voluntarily get thrashed by the deusa.
We left the mansion behind and climbed the mountain in silence. When we reached the cave, the cold wind died at the entrance. Silver stopped before the black stone pit of the forge.
"Light the forge," he commanded, his voice echoing off the rocky walls. "Show me you at least know the basics of where to start."
I knelt before the hearth. The smell of cold ash and burnt stone pulled me violently into the past. To Roberto's workshop back in my village in Safe Haven. I remembered the raw heat slapping my child face, the sweat on the old blacksmith's brow as he taught me how to stack the base, how to align the fuel so as not to choke the flame, and how to respect the timing of oxygen.
I grabbed the heavy, worn leather bellows hanging from the side of the stone structure. I positioned the flammable kindling at the bottom of the pit and struck the flint with a sharp hit of steel. A solitary spark jumped, catching the soot.
Immediately, I began pumping the bellows with both hands. The rhythmic sound of thick leather sucking and spitting air filled the cave's silence. The small ember popped, fed on the rush of oxygen, and rapidly expanded. Within minutes, the forge roared to life, transforming into a towering blaze that crackled and danced, illuminating the rustic walls with vibrant shadows of orange and red.
The flame was at its exact sweet spot, roaring with heat. I stood up, wiping the soot from my hands onto my pants, but as I looked at the large dark iron crucible positioned over the fire, I noticed something missing. The concave container was completely empty.
I frowned and turned to Silver. "The fire is ready. But where is the base metal? What am I going to forge?"
The platinum god uncrossed his arms and took a step to the side, revealing an immense stone bench at the back of the workshop that had been hidden by the cave's shadows. The surface was covered in perfectly aligned ingots.
"The blade is yours. The foundation of the weapon has to be too," Silver answered, an evaluative half-smile on his face. "Choose."
I walked over to the bench. The variety was staggering. There were blocks of raw iron stained with oxidation, shimmering gold, dark and heavy steel that seemed to absorb light, and gleaming metals of alien origins I didn't even know how to name.
I ran my fingers over the cold surfaces, my mind calculating the aerodynamics of the design I had drawn on the slate the day before. I needed something that could slice through wind resistance without anchoring me to the ground, but wouldn't shatter into a thousand pieces if it collided with the brutal punch of a god. A single metal wouldn't cut it for this duality.
My eyes stopped on two specific blocks.
In my left hand, I lifted an ingot of pure Elven steel, featuring a faintly greenish hue—a league known for being incredibly flexible, fast, and capable of retaining a razor-sharp edge even when breaking the sound barrier.
In my right hand, I picked up a massive block of standard Lavinsk steel—a silver metal, absurdly dense, heavy, and forged under the crushing gravity of the divine capital; practically indestructible.
The air around the furnace distorted the view of the black stones, turning the center of the cave into a shimmering mirror from the extreme heat. Sweat pooled on my forehead and evaporated with a hiss before it could even roll down my neck. The heat the forge began to radiate was a physical inferno.
I deposited the heavy blocks of Lavinsk steel and Elven steel into the dark iron crucible. I hung the container over the incandescent pit and watched the rigid structure of the materials begin to yield.
Silver watched from the shadows, the firelight reflecting in his green irises.
"If your blood is to be the anchor of this blade, Suki," his voice cut through the popping embers, cold and calculating, "it can't just be poured over the cold steel after it's done. The soul of the metal is born in the fusion. The steel needs to drink your life while it changes shape."
I didn't need further explanation. I understood the requirement of that sacrifice perfectly.
The two steels in the crucible were already transforming into a glowing, molten mass, swirling viscously like a small ocean of magma. My eyes wandered to the nearby stone bench and stopped on an old, forgotten forge knife. The handle was rough, and at the base of the short, dark blade, the word *Salvaria* was carved. Another name. Another silenced memory from my master's past.
I gripped the knife and turned my gaze back to the infernal pit of the forge. The blinding glare invaded my pupils and, for a millisecond, the rocky wall of the cave vanished.
The hissing of that molten metal became the deafening roar of scarlet scales. The heat slapped my face with the same force as the dragon's breath reducing my village to ashes. The smell of the forge became the stench of rotting wood and charred flesh, and the echo of my village's screams exploded in my ears.
I drew breath violently, slamming my feet into the stone to drag my mind back to the Lavinsk workshop.
"No fire burns hotter than that day," I murmured, my voice coming out like a rusted blade, drenched in hatred and promise.
Without hesitating, I pressed the sharp edge of the knife against the palm of my left hand and pulled with brutality. The flesh split open in a nasty, deep gash, and hot blood bubbled out instantly, pouring over my fingers.
I dropped the knife onto the bench and took a step forward. I stretched my wounded arm directly into the open mouth of the forge, right above the crucible.
The lethal heat whipped against my unprotected skin; the hairs on my forearm scorched and vanished in a thin cloud of acrid smoke. The fire licked my flesh, making the skin redden and burn with an intensity that would make any ordinary man scream and recoil.
But my teeth only clenched. It burned, yes. It hurt like hell, yes.
But my soul had already survived the bottom of the abyss. Compared to the fire that took my parents from me, this was nothing more than a warm breeze.
I balled my fist suspended over the glowing puddle and squeezed the open wound.
Thick, red drops plummeted down. The moment my blood touched the molten alloy, a sharp, piercing hiss exploded in the air. The scarlet liquid didn't evaporate from the heat; it was ravenously swallowed by the bubbling magma. I felt as if a living connection opened between my chest and the iron pot. The blood transformed into ruby embers, spreading crimson filaments throughout the entire stretch of the greenish and silver alloy.
When the last drop fell, I yanked my arm back into the safety of the shadows. The extreme heat of the furnace had acted as a macabre healer: the edges of the deep cut on my palm were already cauterized, fused instantly into a thick, puckered scar.
Silver uncrossed his arms, his posture solemn. "Prepare the molds and the anvil," he ordered, his deep tone echoing off the rock walls. "The foundation is sealed. Now it is time to shape the steel."
I walked with wide, rapid strides. I aligned the iron molds and adjusted the heavy tongs at the edge of the forge. With precise movements to avoid losing the ideal temperature, I grabbed the crucible with the tool, pulled it from the emerald flames, and tilted the container over the rectangular mold.
The glowing mixture flowed. The Lavinsk steel, the Elven steel, and my own blood poured out like a dense, living river of fire. The new metal filled the mold, unifying into a single, perfect dark block that I would fold, hammer, and forge until it surpassed the physical limits of matter.
I watched the heat slowly recede until the alloy hardened and lost the blinding glare that obstructed my vision. With heavy breath, I removed the newly cooled ingot—a metallic piece that had literally been born from my own flesh. I threw it back into the entrails of the forge to soften it for the hammer.
I gripped the worn leather handle of the sledgehammer with my newly scarred hand. I squared my stance, stared into the flames, and dragged the block back onto the anvil.
**CLANG!**
I struck the first time. The metallic chime sang through the rocky walls. The shower of sparks that sprayed and scorched the floor around me wasn't just golden anymore; it carried a dark, crimson brilliance. The color of my blood.
"Your wrist is too tense!" Silver's voice whipped from behind the crash. "You're striking with anger, trying to dent stone! The steel has already drunk your life, Suki. It already possesses your fury."
"Now it needs direction. Guide the metal."
I ground my teeth, ignoring the burning in my wounded palm. I adjusted my base, digging my feet into the rocky ground, lowering my center of gravity, and locking my hips. I raised the hammer, shifting the focus of my mind. I didn't want to destroy the mass; I wanted to stretch, refine, and polish the soul I had just forged.
**CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!**
The rhythmic sound took over the mountain. From the shadows, Silver watched the ruby and golden sparks reflect in my hyper-focused eyes. The platinum god realized that the cave walls had vanished for me; the entire universe had shrunk, now reduced strictly to my wrist, the anvil, and that glowing piece of metal. It was an intimate, violent conversation between my core and the steel. Respecting the gravity of that baptism, Silver turned his back, his heavy footsteps swallowed by the hissing of the forge as he walked toward the exit, leaving the cave behind, returning to the mansion, and surrendering me to the night that was already falling over Lavinsk.
I didn't even notice when he left; my mind was welded to the blade.
I gripped the flattened, ruby bar with the tongs, struck the tip against the edge of the anvil, and forced the burning metal to fold over itself. I threw the block back into the pit of the forge, pushing my Wind Transformation to the absolute limit to generate a blinding white heat. When the alloy threatened to melt again, I dragged it back to the cold steel.
**CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!**
The sledgehammer came down with methodical violence. I was crushing the two halves of the fold until they fused into a single, indestructible sheet. I was forcing the flexible, aerodynamic molecules of Elven steel to lock themselves around the absurd, crushing density of the Lavinsk silver. My blood acted as the perfect glue for metals that should have never mixed.
I folded the blade. I hammered until it unified. Folded again. Hammered again.
Ten times. Thirty times. Eighty times.
With each new fold, the impurities and flaws of the metal were ejected in violent jets of sparks that burned my bare chest. With every impact of the sledgehammer, the steel grew thinner, more compact, and terrifyingly dense, forced into the realm of the unbreakable. My shoulders screamed in agony, the joints of my fingers threatened to snap under the force I used to hold the tongs, but I didn't stop. I didn't drink water. I didn't blink. The fúnebre silence of the dawn in the realm of the gods was completely obliterated by my symphony of iron.
**CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!**
The sun was already breaking on the horizon, painting the Lavinsk sky a pale, cold gold. The morning dew covered the craters of the courtyard I had destroyed the day before when Silver crossed the lawn with slow, calm steps. The god walked with his hands in his pockets, ascending the steep stone trail.
When Silver finally reached the base of the mountain supporting the cave, he stopped and raised his platinum face. Ripping through the frosty dawn air, the metallic echo still traveled down the slope—heavy, exhausted, but absurdly focused.
*CLANG..... CLANG.....*
It was no longer the deafening crash of folding and crushing. It was the sharp, tearing, precise sound of someone striking the final millimeters of the blade. The sound of a weapon that had just breathed for the very first time.
The muscles in my shoulders and back screamed in absolute agony as I raised the iron sledgehammer for one more strike.
**CLANG!**
My knees buckled dangerously. The bright white light coating my skin began to flicker and fail, threatening to shut down under the extreme exhaustion of my energy core.
Silver didn't take a single step to help me. His eyes were attentive, filled with a silent respect, the mute pride of someone witnessing a will refusing to die.
"The steel has claimed its price, Suki," Silver's voice echoed through the forge—grave, deep, and unyielding like the mountain itself. The master leaned forward slightly. "Go and rest, kid. Prepare yourself for the next step."
### Day 3: The Edge and the Spirit
The sound of the sledgehammer finally died in my mind. When the third day dawned over the cave, the air no longer reeked of suffocating smoke, but carried the damp smell of wet stone and iron powder. The sword's structure was complete, but it was just a dark, matte, brutal bar.
Silver entered the workshop carrying two wooden buckets filled with freezing water from a mountain spring and a velvet-lined box containing a series of sharpening stones—ranging from the most porous and aggressive to the smoothest and most reflective.
"The raw forge shaped the bones and muscles of your weapon," Silver murmured, sitting cross-legged on the stone floor, positioning the first porous block over a wooden mount. He handed me the cold blade. "But now comes the truly important part, Suki. If you mess up the angle now, you will destroy the edge and all the sacrifice you made yesterday."
I knelt before the bucket. I submerged the first stone, the coarsest one, in the water until the bubbles stopped rising. I gripped the bare hilt with my right hand and rested the bandaged fingers of my left over the spine of the blade. I pressed the metal against the stone.
*Shhh... shhh...*
The raspy sound of steel scraping against wet rock filled the cave. Water trickled down the stone, mixing with the metal dust into a dark paste. With each long, firm pass, I defined the geometry of the cutting edge. Silver corrected my posture with sharp taps to my shoulder. "Lower. Keep your wrist locked. Use the weight of your torso, not the strength of your arm."
We swapped stones. From the porous, we went to the medium, erasing the deep scratches left by the previous stage. The friction sound grew softer, more sibilant. My arms were already numb, and the tips of my fingers bled slightly from brushing against the rock, but I couldn't stop.
Finally, Silver pulled out the last stone. It was small, of a nearly pearlescent translucent shade, smooth as glass.
"The final polish," the master whispered. "Erase the raw marks."
I used only the tip of my thumb to press this microscopic stone against the blade's edge, rubbing it in short, slow, perfectly calculated movements. A white paste formed under the friction. When I finished traversing every centimeter of the double-edged stretch, Silver handed me a piece of raw silk.
I wiped the metal clean.
When the damp powder was removed, the darkness of the cave seemed to recede before the blade's brilliance.
The sword was a masterpiece born from chaos. The roughly three-foot blade wasn't ordinary silver; it possessed a dark tone, almost like matte obsidian. But when the sunlight hit it, it revealed fluid, interwoven veins. The emerald-green of the Elven steel danced with the dense silver of Lavinsk, all of it cut by razor-thin, irregular streaks of a deep crimson—my blood, eternalized in the structure of the metal.
The guard was imposing, curving outward in an aerodynamic design. The base near the hilt was slightly thicker and implacable to absorb impacts, before tapering into a profile sharp as a razor, built to whistle with the wind.
In the polished steel that served as a mirror, I saw the two symbols I had engraved at the base: *Suki* and *Silver*. A memory, and my weapon.
"The metal is perfect," Silver declared, breaking the rapturous silence. He stood up, but didn't step closer to touch it. "The edge is ready to slice, but a weapon like this is still blind, Suki."
I frowned, raising my face to him. "Blind?" I questioned, confusion weighing heavy in my voice. I tilted the sword, observing the exact, crystal-clear reflection of my own stunned eyes on the matte obsidian surface. "Silver, I just finished sanding this thing until the tips of my fingers cracked and bled. If I drop a dry leaf on it right now, it gets split in half before it even feels its own weight. What do you mean, blind?"
He took a step back, his calloused hands sinking into his pants pockets. His expression, always loaded with that lethal cynicism, suddenly became impenetrable, almost ceremonial.
"Physically, it cuts, boy. But matter, Suki, is the most fragile and useless thing you will face out there," Silver answered, his voice echoing grave and absolute off the stone walls of the workshop. "A blade without purpose cuts everything in its path, except destiny. Iron without a title is just a tool. You gave it your flesh, your blood, and your breath. Now, give it an identity."
Silver turned his back slowly and walked toward the cave entrance. "Find its name," he ordered, his silhouette swallowed by the golden morning light flooding the mountain. "I'll return when you hear it."
I crossed my legs in the center of the stone floor, resting the cold, flat sword across my lap. I closed my eyes, settling my breathing, letting physical exhaustion give way to a deep trance. My hands rested gently on the newborn steel, my calloused fingers feeling the perfectly smooth texture of the polish.
And, in the darkness of my mind, the sword pulled me into the past.
The cold darkness of the Lavinsk cave melted away, replaced by the muggy heat of an afternoon in Safe Haven. I was about seven years old.
The wooden floorboards of my bedroom vibrated. I was lying down, sunk in the middle of a heavy sleep, when my subconscious registered the sound of tiny, desperate footsteps running down the hallway of my house. Before I could open my eyes, the woven straw door was slammed open with a violence that made it crash resoundingly against the wall.
"Suki! Wake up!"
I bolted upright in bed, my heart hammering in my chest from the absolute fright. Carina was standing on the threshold. Her hair was plastered to her forehead with sweat, her chest heaving frantically as she drew breath in short gasps.
"They're losing!" she screamed, her eyes wide. "All of them!"
I rubbed my face, still groggy from sleep, blinking to try and focus my vision on my friend. "What? What do you mean losing?" I asked, my voice dragged out and confused.
"A new girl!" Carina replied, flailing her arms wildly. "She managed to beat everyone in the yard! She's the God of Games now, and nobody can knock her down!"
The sleep evaporated from my body in that exact same millisecond.
*Impossible,* I thought, throwing the blankets aside. Henrique, Fernando, and I were the untouchable kings of that village. We were the strongest, and Carina was our right hand in strategies. How does someone just show up and topple everyone?
"Where are they?!" I demanded, jumping out of bed barefoot.
"At the yard by Roberto's forge! Come on, hurry!"
I didn't wait for her to finish. I sprinted out of the house with Carina hot on my heels.
We ran through the village's dirt streets, dodging wooden wagons and adults talking in doorways. The smell of hot soot and metal from Roberto's workshop began to invade my nostrils. When we reached the main yard, the place was absolute madness. A crowd of kids our age, and even some older boys, formed a tight circle in the center of the dirt square. The sound of clashing wood and cheers echoed under the harsh sun.
"Excuse me! Move out of the way!" I growled, shoving my way through the shoulders of the other boys until I managed to reach the front line of the circle.
The scene that revealed itself left me jaw-dropped.
In the center of the ring, covered in dust and with a wild, victorious grin on her face, stood a girl I had never seen before. She was laughing out loud, hands on her hips, and her feet... her feet were planted squarely right on top of Henrique's round belly. He was sprawled on the ground, groaning in pain. Right next to him, Fernando was face-down in the dirt, completely breathless and defeated. But the instant he raised his head and locked eyes with me, his face lit up.
Fernando spat out a handful of dirt, forced a giant smile, and yelled for the entire yard to hear: "Hahaha! You're screwed now! Our best fighter just got here!" He pointed a dirty finger directly at me. "Suki Nakamura!!!"
The girl stopped laughing and turned her face in my direction. Beneath her boots, Henrique let out a squeezed groan, opened his defeated eyes, and extended a chubby hand to me in a pathetic signal for help.
I walked with firm steps toward them. I leaned down and picked up Henrique's splintered wooden shield and Fernando's training sword lying in the dust. The weight of the gear in my hands brought a wave of absolute confidence. I struck the wooden blade against the shield, making a hollow, challenging clack.
"Who are you?" I asked, raising my chin.
The girl didn't shrink a single millimeter. She puffed out her chest and pointed her own wooden sword right at my nose.
"I am Susen!" she declared, her voice loud and full of an unshakeable childhood authority. "The current strongest warrior of this village, and the Guardian Goddess of all of you!"
I ground my teeth, tightening my grip on Fernando's sword hilt. "That title was mine!"
The circle of kids exploded into whistles and shouts. Even Roberto the blacksmith stopped hammering the glowing steel in his shop and leaned against the doorframe to watch the new battle.
I attacked first.
I charged forward, kicking up dust, and unleashed a heavy vertical strike, putting all the weight of my seven-year-old body into crushing her guard.
**TOCK!**
The sound of colliding wood cracked in the air. Susen didn't just block my attack perfectly; she used the impact to slide her sword down mine, pushing my defense off-axis. I lost my balance for a second. That was enough. She spun her body with absurd speed, ducked under my arm, and smacked the flat of her blade against the back of my knee.
My leg gave out, but I rolled through the dirt to escape her follow-up strike. I scrambled up quickly, panting. *She's really strong,* I realized, the shock cooling my anger. *Her movements have zero hesitation.*
We traded blows again. Dust rose around us as the wooden swords clashed frantically. I tried to use the shield to pin her, but Susen moved like the wind, always dodging at the last split-second and countering with precise thrusts that bit painfully into my ribs and arms.
My chest rose and fell. Sweat stung my eyes. In a final, desperate effort, I gathered all my strength and launched a wide horizontal slash, trying to disarm her with raw force.
Susen flashed a confident grin. She didn't block. Instead, she stepped into the attack, intercepting my wrist with her free hand before the blade could reach her. With her other hand, she slammed her wooden sword with crushing force against my forearm.
The pain numbed all the way to my shoulder. My fingers opened instantly. My sword went spinning through the air, landing with a dull thud several meters away. The shield slipped and clattered onto the dirt.
I dropped to my knees on the dusty ground, breath caught in my throat, completely defeated in front of the entire village.
The crowd around fell silent for a moment before beginning to whisper in pure shock. The legend of Suki Nakamura had just been toppled.
Susen walked up to me. Her shadow blocked out the sun hitting my face. She didn't laugh, nor did she mock me as I expected. Leaning the tip of her weapon on the ground, she panted slightly, her face smeared with dirt, and stared at me with genuine respect.
"You were a worthy opponent," she said, her voice full of conviction. "Tell me... what is the name of your sword?!"
I raised my face, blinking, utterly confused by the absurd question. "Name?" I stammered. "Who gives a name to a piece of wood?"
Susen's expression flipped instantly. Respect gave way to deep irritation. She stomped hard on the ground and, by accident or maybe on purpose, planted her boot right back on Henrique's stomach, drawing another squeezed groan from the chubby boy.
"Every sword has a name!!!" she scolded, insulted by my lack of imagination.
The anger of defeat bubbled in my chest. I clenched my fists in the dirt and yelled back at her: "Oh, yeah?! Then what's yours called?!"
The girl flashed a wide, victorious smile. She took a step forward, stepping firmly on Henrique to gain height, and raised her wooden sword to the sky. The midday sun struck the splintered tip of the wooden stick directly, making it look bathed in gold. The sword's shadow projected long and sharp right across the middle of my face.
Susen puffed out her chest, drew in a breath, and screamed with the full force of her lungs, so that every inhabitant of that village, every kid, and even the blacksmith could hear:
"It is called **KAZEKIBA**!!!!!!"
The echo of that childhood shout snapped in my mind, blending with the wind and shattering the illusion of the past. The burning afternoon light of Safe Haven was sucked back into the cool twilight of the forge workshop. The smell of dust and childhood evaporated.
I wept. The longing for my friends and for home rushed back with full force, but the sword did not reject the tears; it seemed to embrace the sadness, the pain, and the implacable determination of one who refused to be a victim.
"Now..."
I opened my eyes with a jolt. Silver's deep voice sounded from the cave entrance. My master's silhouette cut through the yellowish light of dusk.
"...does it have a name?" he asked, his green gaze fixed on me, awaiting the baptism.
The word was already forged onto my tongue, brought from the echo of a girl's voice who was no longer here, from a stolen god-title in a dirt yard, from a game that represented the beginning of everything. I wiped the tears from my face with the back of my dirty hand and raised the blade, feeling the perfect balance of something that belonged entirely to my soul and my history.
I thought for a millisecond, and then answered with a firmness that silenced the mountain's echoes:
"**Kazekiba**."