Ironhold Keep - The Baron's StudyDay 4.
"Failed again."
Dante tossed a smoking, twisted lump of metal onto the desk. It had once been a steel dagger. Now, it looked like melted wax.
He was experimenting.
He had connected the Mage's Mana Core to the dagger using copper wire, attempting to create a "Shock Blade." The theory was sound: channel mana into the metal to create an electrified edge.
The result was a disaster.
[Experiment Failed.][Material Analysis: Iron/Steel Alloy.][Conductivity: Low. Resistance: High.][Result: Thermal Overload. The metal melted before the mana could stabilize.]
Dante leaned back, rubbing his temples.
"I see," he muttered. "Iron is too porous. The atomic lattice is too loose to hold high-density mana. It's like trying to push a river through a straw. It just bursts."
He frowned, looking at the copper wire remnants on the desk.
"But it worked on Voss," Dante whispered to himself. "I used this same copper wire and an iron dagger to conduct the mana into his leg."
He analyzed the memory, his eyes narrowing.
"The output was different. With Voss, I was just letting the mana 'leak' into his nerves. A trickle. Copper and Iron can handle a trickle. But trying to force a combat-grade current through them? They melt."
He picked up the copper wire, turning it over in his fingers.
"Still... the copper held up better than the iron. Why? Copper isn't a heavy metal. Is it the electron configuration? Or does it have a latent compatibility I haven't discovered yet?"
He tossed the wire aside. It was a variable he couldn't solve yet. A mystery for another time.
"Iron is fine for kinetic weapons," Dante mused. "But for magic? It's trash. If I want to build Magitech—railguns, energy shields, mana-fused armor—I need a superconductor. I need heavy, dense metals."
He looked at the map on his desk. The red circle in the Northern Mountains.
The Uranium Mine.
"Uranium," Dante smiled. "Density 19.1 grams per cubic centimeter. Almost three times denser than iron. If my theory is correct, it won't just hold the mana... it will amplify it."
He stood up, grabbing his coat.
"Elara! Assemble the squad. We're going hunting."
The Northern Mountains (The Forbidden Zone)Four Hours Later.
The air up here tasted metallic.
Dante led a squad of twenty soldiers. They were fully equipped with the new Mass-Produced Plate Armor and Arquebuses. They looked formidable, a black stain moving against the white snow.
But as they climbed higher, the men grew uneasy. The birds stopped singing. The trees became twisted, their bark black and oozing.
[Warning: Environmental Radiation Detected.][Levels: 3.5 Roentgen/hr. Safe for short exposure.]
"My Lord," Elara whispered, gripping her rifle. "The locals say a Dragon sleeps here. A 'Green Death' that breathes invisible fire."
"Dragons are biological entities," Dante said dismissively, checking his Geiger counter. "They bleed, they suffocate, and they die when you put a 50-gram lead ball through their brain."
Dante was confident. He had crushed a Baron. He had guns. What could a lizard do?
They reached the mouth of a massive cave. The entrance was lined with glowing green crystals.
[Resource Detected: Raw Uranium Ore.][Mana Concentration: Extreme.]
"Jackpot," Dante grinned. "Secure the perimeter. I want samples."
ROAAAAAR!
The ground didn't shake—it heaved.
From the darkness of the cave, something massive lunged.
It wasn't the slow, clumsy movement of the Frost Wolves. It was a blur of green scales and muscle.
"Contact!" Dante shouted. "Fire at will!"
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Twenty Arquebuses fired in a staggered volley. Smoke filled the canyon. The sound was deafening.
Dante waited for the kill notification.
It didn't come.
Through the smoke, a massive tail whipped out.
CRACK.
Three of his soldiers were smashed into red paste against the canyon wall. Their "Mass Produced" armor crumpled like paper.
The smoke cleared.
Standing on top of a rock outcropping was the Old One.
It was a Drake, about forty feet long. But it was mutated. Its scales glowed with a sick, pulsating green light. Tumors and crystalline growths jutted out of its spine. It didn't breathe fire—it leaked a corrosive, glowing gas from its maw.
[Target: Radium Wyrm (Tier 3 Mutated Beast)][Armor: Mana-Hardened Scales.][Threat Level: DEADLY.]
"Reload!" Elara screamed, panic in her voice.
The Wyrm opened its mouth. A stream of green bile shot out, hitting two soldiers. They didn't burn—they dissolved. Their armor hissed and melted, fusing to their flesh as they screamed in agony.
"Bullets didn't penetrate," Dante realized, his heart skipping a beat. "The lead flattened against the scales."
He had underestimated the density. This thing had been soaking in mana and radiation for centuries. Its scales were harder than tank armor.
"Retreat!" Dante ordered. "Fall back to the rocks!"
The squad scrambled, firing desperate, useless shots.
The Wyrm lunged at Dante.
Dante dove, rolling behind a boulder just as the beast's jaws snapped the air where his head had been. He came up holding his Arquebus, firing point-blank at the creature's eye.
PING.
The bullet bounced off the eyelid.
The Wyrm stared at him, its slit pupil contracting. It mocked him.
Dante was cornered. His men were dying. His weapons were useless.
I'm going to die here, Dante thought. Hubris. I got cocky.
He reached into his pocket, his hand brushing against the Mana Core he had taken from Voss's Mage. It was warm, pulsing.
He looked at the cave wall next to him.
A massive vein of Raw Uranium jutted out of the rock, glowing with that same sick green light.
[System Alert][Catalyst Material Detected: Uranium-238 (Enriched).][Hypothesis: Heavy Metal Superconductivity.][Calculating Solutions...]
A flashing crimson window appeared in Dante's vision, overriding his panic.
[Emergency Blueprint Generated: Prototype Rail Cannon (Disposable).][Warning: Current Materials cannot sustain output. Weapon will suffer catastrophic thermal failure after one shot.][Cost to Fabricate: 5,250 Gold Coins (Total Liquid Assets) + Mage Core.]
Dante stared at the number. 5,250 Gold. It was every coin he had looted from Ironhold. It was his army's salary for the next year. It was his future.
The Wyrm reared back, its throat glowing green as it prepared to spew acid.
"FUCK IT!" Dante screamed, glaring at the beast with eyes full of madness and pain. "I AM GOING TO KILL YOU!"
"System! BUY IT!"
[Transaction Approved.][Fabricating...]
The air around Dante distorted. The gold coins in his digital inventory vanished instantly.
In his hands, the primitive iron Arquebus began to twist and groan. Blue light engulfed it. The iron barrel was torn apart and reconstructed. Massive, heavy coils of dark alloy—forged from the System's energy—wrapped around a reinforced chamber.
It was heavy. It hummed with a terrifying, unstable power.
[Weapon Ready.][Insert Catalyst.]
Dante jammed the Mage's Mana Core into the open slot on the side of the gun. He grabbed a jagged chunk of raw Uranium ore from the ground and shoved it into the chamber.
The gun screamed. The coils lit up with blinding blue light. The Mage Core began to crack, draining instantly to power the magnetic rails.
"DIE, YOU BASTARD!" Dante screamed, aiming the massive barrel at the Wyrm's chest.
He pulled the trigger.
ZZA-KOOOM!
It wasn't a bullet. It was a streak of blue lightning.
The Uranium slug was accelerated to Mach 7 in a fraction of a second. The recoil was so violent it dislocated Dante's shoulder, throwing him backward into the snow.
The beam struck the Wyrm.
There was no bounce. There was no resistance.
The heavy metal projectile, empowered by the superconductive mana, punched a hole straight through the Wyrm's chest and blew out the other side, pulverizing the rock wall behind it.
The beast shrieked—a sound of pure terror—as the blast knocked it backward, slamming it into the opposite cliff face.
HISSSS.
Steam rose from Dante's hands.
The Rail Cannon in his grip was glowing red hot. Then, it began to crumble. The metal dripped like water, the coils fused together. As the System warned, it was a one-time weapon.
Dante lay in the snow, gasping for air, clutching his dislocated shoulder. He looked at the pile of slag that used to be his 5,000 gold pieces.
Smoke rose from the Wyrm's chest. A massive, cauterized hole smoked where the beam had hit. The beast wasn't dead, but it was thrashing, unable to stand.
[Target Critical.][Hypothesis Confirmed: Heavy Metals amplify Magical Output.][New Blueprint Unlocked: The Railgun (Requires Stable Alloys).]
Dante lay in the snow, staring up at the grey sky. His shoulder throbbed with a dull, sickening rhythm, and his reserves were completely empty.
5,250 Gold. Gone. Five men. Dead.
It was a disaster. A tactical failure born of arrogance.
But then, his eyes drifted to the glowing blue notification still floating in his vision.
[Blueprint Saved: The Railgun.]
A weak, pained smile touched his lips.
"I made a mistake," Dante whispered to the cold air, his voice cracking. "But at least I got this out of it."
He heard the crunch of snow. Elara was running toward him, her face pale with panic. She skidded to her knees beside him, her hands hovering over his dislocated shoulder.
A faint, trembling white light gathered in her palms. It felt warm, like a dying ember, but it flickered and died against his skin, unable to knit the damaged tissue.
Dante blinked, fighting the darkness. "Wait... you know healing magic?"
"I'm trying!" Elara sobbed, the light sputtering out completely. "My mother taught me the basics, but I... I don't know how to use it well. It's not enough!"
Dante couldn't answer. His vision faded to black.