The Iron Cathedral was a graveyard of twisted metal and black frost. The silence following the explosion was heavy, broken only by the rhythmic hiss of escaping steam from the severed pipes. Vane lay in the center of the crater, his fingers twitching toward the star-steel spear that had rolled a few feet away. His mana core felt like a burnt-out furnace: cold, hollow, and jagged. Every breath was a labor of agony, the air in his lungs feeling like a mixture of iron filings and freezing mist.
The phantom of Senna had vanished, but the psychic weight of the [Perfect Copy] lingered like an echo. Using the combat logic of an Expert in an Elite body had exacted a terrifying price. Vane could feel the microscopic fractures in his bones and the way his mana channels were frayed, like wires carrying ten times their rated voltage. He looked at his hands; they were trembling uncontrollably, the skin blackened by the frost of the Sovereign's Mantle.
