Eight months had passed since I first stepped over the threshold of Master Bruce’s winery.
I sat in my new workshop—a small annex attached to the tavern. Lit by a pair of high-quality magical lamps, the Centurion lay on the table.
Over those months, I had realized that this dead titan was fine as a sledgehammer, but completely unsuited for basic survival. My body was quite literally falling apart under its weight. Due to the shifted center of gravity, my spine had begun to curve, and my left knee throbbed with every change in the weather.
So, I performed a complete deconstruction.
Now the prosthesis weighed a mere three kilograms. I replaced the heavy, cast plates with a hollow skeletal frame made of aircraft-grade duralumin (or rather, its magical equivalent—"wind steel," which I bartered from a smuggler). The outer casing consisted of razor-thin plates from the Chitinics' shells, which proved to be incredibly durable yet lightweight. Instead of crude bolts, I implemented a system of tension cables made from mountain lizard tendons.
I buckled the straps of the prosthesis. The buckles tightened over my shoulder with a familiar click. I clenched my fist, listening closely. No clanking. Only the barely audible rustle of chitinous scales.
"Well then, partner," I whispered, staring at the matte surface of the metal. "Let's see how you handle real stone."
The Ostrom Mercenary Guild greeted me with silence. There used to be a constant hum here, but now, the moment I walked in, conversations died down. My reputation as the "Iron Ghost" had taken permanent root.
I approached the counter. The very same clerk who had once handed me my copper token now obligingly laid a sheet with a silver border before me.
"Silver rank, Master Iron. Right up your alley."
I took the sheet.
[CONTRACT: ELIMINATION OF A STONE GUARDIAN]
Location: The Pass of Seven Winds.
Description: The beast has blocked the main trade route. Magical attacks are ineffective.
Reward: 40 gold coins.
Silver on paper, gold in reality. The Guild was understating the threat level again, just to bait someone into taking the risk.
Forty gold. A massive sum. You could buy a small house in Ostrom with that. But I knew perfectly well why nobody else would touch this contract. A Stone Guardian was an ancient construct whose structure was maintained by an internal core of high-density mana. To shatter it, you needed either legendary or mythical magical weaponry, or... me.
"I'll take it," I said curtly.
"Would you like to hire a support squad?" The clerk looked hopefully toward a group of mercenaries in the corner, who were clearly waiting for my decision.
"No."
The Pass of Seven Winds
The Pass of Seven Winds met me with an icy gale. The mountains here were ancient and jagged, covered in hoarfrost and scarred by the remnants of past magical storms.
The Guardian stood right in the middle of the road. It was colossal—nearly four meters tall. A crude pile of unrefined granite assembled into a humanoid shape. It had no face, only a single glowing horizontal slit where its head should be, pouring out a harsh blue light.
I stopped ten meters away.
[TARGET ANALYSIS: STONE GUARDIAN]
Mass: Approximately 4.5 tons.
Center of Gravity: Shifted upward due to broad shoulders (critical weak point).
Structure: Granite blocks bound by a localized force field.
Vulnerability: Central core located behind the third layer of plates in the chest area.
The Guardian slowly turned its "head" in my direction. The ground shuddered beneath its feet as it took its first step.
I shrugged off my cloak.
The Guardian swung for a crushing blow.
I ducked beneath the strike. A boulder-sized fist whistled mere inches from my head, kicking up a blinding cloud of stone dust. Using the monster's own momentum against it, I slipped right into its guard, directly in front of its torso.
I landed a series of rapid, rhythmic strikes with my prosthesis across various points of its body, feeling out its frequency.
Thud. Thud. Thud. The sound of the impacts shifted—a dull thud against the thigh, a sharp ring against the shoulder. I was searching for the exact "note" at which its mana core vibrated.
The Guardian tried to swat me away. I scrambled up its protruding stone edges, forcing it to spin in place and lose its footing.
Finally, I found it. A point in the center of its chest, just behind the second seam of plates. That was where the vibration ran purest.
It was time to wrap this up. I could feel the freezing mountain air burning my lungs, and the muscles of my left arm were starting to go numb from the cold.
I leaped back. The Guardian crouched low to the ground, bracing for a devastating ramming charge.
Will to Live.
I began tuning the prosthesis's internal frequency. My right arm trembled violently. The chitinous plates on the Centurion vibrated so intensely that the air surrounding my arm began to smoke, venting the sharp scent of ozone.
The Guardian lunged forward.
I thrust my right arm straight out, palm open.
"Resonance," I commanded in my mind.
The strike landed precisely in the center of the monster's chest—right at the focal point where all the construct's ley lines converged. At the exact millisecond of contact, I discharged the accumulated frequency.
A wave of pure resonance rippled through the granite. It reached the internal mana core and went completely out of phase with its oscillations.
Crack.
The massive Guardian froze. The blue glow in its "head" flared brilliantly for a fraction of a second and then instantly died out. Fine white fractures shot across its stone body. One at first, then hundreds, then thousands.
A second later, it exploded into fine sand at my feet.
I stood in the middle of the dust cloud, my arm still outstretched. And then I collapsed to my knees, nearly cracking my head open against the rocks.
I violently vomited blood into the sand left behind by the Guardian.
"Like hell..." I rasped, struggling to force air back into my lungs.
At that moment, a caravan appeared from around a bend in the road. The merchants and their security guards, who had been hiding in the gorge to watch the battle, were now cautiously approaching.
One of the hirelings—a tall man with a jagged scar running across his entire face—approached me first. He kept a cautious hand on the hilt of his sword, even though I clearly posed no threat in this broken state.
"Hey, kid... you alive?" he asked, peering carefully beneath my hood.
I looked up, locking my eyes directly onto his.
The mercenary violently recoiled, turning deathly pale.
"He's possessed! The boy's possessed!"
They didn't dare come any closer.
Dragging myself up with immense effort, I walked over to the spot where the Guardian's heart used to be. Lying in the sand was a crystal—a pure, pulsing mana core the size of a fist. It was spiderwebbed with cracks, but still brimmed with residual energy.
I shoved the core into my bag and, limping heavily, began my descent down the pass.
"Hey!" a merchant from the caravan called out after me. "What's your name?"
I ignored him entirely, keeping my eyes on the road ahead.
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