Chương 31: Star-Element: Metal

'Star-Element Gauntlet' The Star-Element Gauntlet is an Elementum-Class relic bestowed upon all Fated Heroes by the Curator Church when they are named, obtained through the offering of a starstone core, five branch-aligned conducting metals, and the severed forelimb of a high-grade astral beast. In its initial state, the Star-Element Gauntlet possesses five empty nodes and no inherent elemental ability.

Its true value lies in its capacity for successive refinement; each node may be awakened through a separate offering of magic materials, with the nature and quality of each offering determining the worldly element brought under the gauntlet's command. The First Hero is recorded to have awakened his gauntlet with five forms of earth: stone, soil, clay, sand, and crystal. The Second Hero awakened hers with five forms of metal: iron, silver, copper, gold, and astral lead.

The Third Hero awakened his with five forms of flora: moss, roots, bark, leaf, and flowering plants. The Fourth Hero awakened hers with five forms of water: riverwater, seawater, mist, ice, and bloodwater. No other relic in known history has demonstrated such breadth of worldly command. For this reason, the Star-Element Gauntlet is regarded by many as the relic with the single greatest potential for destruction and creation in the world.

—Excerpt from'Observations on Relics and the Divine', Written by Naghari the Sage The three minecarts slammed into the four-horned demon all at once. Strong as he was, the demon had to screech to a halt with both blade-arms raised just to block—and still the three giant minecarts slammed into him hard enough to send him flying, driving him back across the chamber. Orland blinked under his mask. That worked. The sensation of pulling on those minecarts was a little different from pulling on earth.

He could still tell he'd spent about ten mana on lifting and throwing each of those carts, but if pulling on earth was like running his fingers through and kneading soft clay into something useful, pulling on metal was more like…. grabbing metal and forcing it to bend to his will. So he looked down at the gem on the palm on his gauntlet, staring at the second silver node that'd lit up on the five-pointed star.

Name: Star-Element Gauntlet Type: Active Elementum-Class Relic, Rare-2 Attribute Addition: +10 Might Ability Description: When mana is channeled into the gauntlet, the holder can control all earthly and metallic materials in a small area around themselves with great visualization. The mana activation cost depends on the amount of materials being controlled. The gauntlet can be upgraded to control three more elements.

The types of materials offered for the upgrade will determine the elements that can be controlled, while the qualities of the materials will determine the variety of the element that can be controlled. Once a new element is obtained, it cannot be removed.

Still can't read the words. But it's a higher-grade relic now, and it's also giving me … five more levels in might? And could I've always upgraded it to control more than one element?

"Of course you could've," grumbled the furious lady in his left ear.

"Even if you'd offered a lump of iron as a main offering for the upgrade, you would've been able to control iron long ago—you're just not supposed to do that, and offer a higher quality metal so that you can control a stronger metal instead."

"It's your fortune as a Hero that Miriyela had a crown made of vezhramir," the young girl whispered in his other ear.

"Vezhramir's a super rare metal that can be transmuted into any type of metal, so in essence, vezhramir is every metal all at once. That's why you can now control all types of metal."

"And for your information, the Curator Church must've offered a rare earth material that represents all types of earth in order to obtain the Star-Element Gauntlet you've been carrying until now," the calm man said from somewhere behind him.

"That's why you're also able to manipulate all types of earth. In a way, it's a blessing you couldn't read. If you'd know you could've upgraded your gauntlet to control more elements, you might've offered some random metal that you wouldn't be able to find in abundance in the environments you'll be traveling through, making your ability to control that metal… useless."

"Oh, but if only the Princess of Kamengrad knew how the upgrades for the Star-Element Gauntlet worked," the old man whispered from somewhere above him.

"If she knew her crown could've allowed you to obtain the ability to control all metals from the start, this would've been a much simpler battle. It is, indeed, a blessing as well that the intricacies of the Star-Element Gauntlet are not widely known by the public." For half a breath, the chamber seemed to blur around him again, but not from the space-distorting rift this time. He felt as though five ghastly spirits were suddenly standing beside him, featureless and formed from pale outlines.

There was the calm man, the young girl, the old man, the furious lady, and then… The young man. All of them lifted their arms and pointed at the four-horned demon as one.

"Now fight," they said.

"... Yeah," he whispered.

"That part I can do." As the demon tore himself free of the shattered carts, his bladed arms cracked from wrist to shoulder, Orland thought he looked much worse than before. Astral lead had now crawled across his throat, down his furred ribs, and along the roots of his horns. His corruption must've accelerated while fighting Miriyela, which meant there was probably a limit to how strong he could get.

Orland felt his songiron bands tugging in different directions, alerting him to all the metal scattered around the chamber. Minecarts. Rails. Nails. Pickaxes. Ore chunks. Broken weapons. Demon parts corrupted with astral lead, too, though even thinking about controlling them made his stomach feel like hurling. Ignoring the astral lead, he curled his gauntleted fingers into a claw and yanked it up. Metal ripped up from all around the chamber.

Nails tore from beams, broken pickheads skidded across the ground, and rail spikes spun out from twisted tracks. It was ten mana's worth of loose metal debris, and then he pointed his gauntlet at the demon, grinning from ear to ear. The demon's head snapped up, and he dodged the first wave of projectiles and slashed through the second. His newly regenerated blade-arms moved fast.

A nail cut across his cheek and a pickhead punched into his shoulder, but most of the debris were deflected, split, or shattered before they could bury deep. Then the demon charged him once again, snarling with a lead-corrupted voice.

"Th̵e̵ ̷He̴r̵o̵ ̴must̷ d̷ie!" In response, Orland planted his feet, reared his gauntlet back, and sucked in a deep breath. He had a plan. He gathered another ten mana's worth of bolts, nails, rail shards, and metal plating from the minecarts around him, wrapping them around his right hand to cobble together a giant metal fist as big as the one he'd pummeled Kazimir with. As the demon neared him, he punched forward and sent the metal fist launching like a battering ram.

The demon lowered one shoulder and slid past it, its blade-arms creating sparks where they screeched past the metal fist. Orland had to admit, the demon seemed even faster than before somehow. All that astral lead corruption hadn't weakened his battle instincts at all. But the demon blinked when Orland wasn't where he was standing after dodging past the metal fist. Instead, Orland had jumped with his sylph shoes the moment his fist flew, using the crude metal mass as cover.

Now he was directly above the demon's horns, and what had he learned about the elkkin demons earlier? They can't look up quickly! Poor, ugly goat! With his left hand, he tossed a handful of bolts and nails he'd pulled from the floor before jumping. With his gauntlet, he flicked his fingers, and two mana was all he spent to propel his metal projectiles down.

The demon hissed and instinctively raised his arms to block the rain of metal from above, but unlike the first volley, he couldn't look up and see where the debris was coming from. Nails stabbed through his shoulders, arms, and the thick muscles across his lead-infested pelt. He roared and slashed upwards aimlessly, but Orland kicked another burst of wind from his shoes and dashed away, skidding to a halt several dozens of paces away. Alright!

He grinned from ear to ear, watching the demon sway and stagger before him. My earth constructs can't break his lead pelt even if they're ten-mana strong, but even two-mana pieces of metal can do some damage! In that case, I'll just keep up the— But suddenly the four-horned demon rallied.

His furred back exploded with even more lumps of astral lead, growing, bubbling, twitching and warbling like a living infection, and before Orland could even take back out of caution, he was already charging again—driven by corruption more than muscle. Both jagged blade-arms swung for Orland in crossing arcs, and Orland raised his gauntlet to block, pulling in as much metal as he could to form a shield. He was too late. And still it didn't matter.

Miriyela and Sharsana lunged in from both sides as well, the princess catching one blade with her warhammer while the moledrake caught the other with her bite. Both of them immediately shuddered and grimaced under the force, but neither backed off from being Orland's shield anyways.

"Fire metal at him, Great Hero!" Miriyela shouted, voice strained with pain and effort.

"Cut him open! Nail his wretched sermon to the stone and—" Orland didn't. He clenched his hands into a fist and dashed straight forward instead, wrapping five mana's worth of metal around his fists to punch the demon in the face. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. The blow snapped the demon's head back, but Orland followed, moving past Miriyela and Sharsana to stay in melee range.

"Who says the Hero has to be the mage hiding behind his companions?" he snarled.

"What, you thought I'd stand back and throw projectiles while everyone else has their fun? Fuck you! I can beat you man-to-man!" Five mana around the left fist. Five mana around the right. The scraps gathered into crude gauntlets, uneven and ugly, but he didn't need proper weapons. Proper was for rich merchant boys with tutors and mentors. Orland had always relied on nothing but his own two hands to survive, and even now, that was enough. He drove one metal-wrapped fist into the demon's ribs.

The next struck his jaw. A third hammered into his chest where the minecarts had already dented flesh and lead. The demon growled and tried to counter, but Orland kept moving in closer, punching and pummeling before the larger astral lead weapons could regenerate in full. Metal bent around his hands with each punch, and he felt his mana burn away in sharp chunks as he kept replacing his scrap metal gauntlets with more scrap metal, but his whole body was roaring with the joy of finally hitting back. More!

More metal! On a hard uppercut that sent the demon reeling back, Orland grabbed the air before him with his gauntlet and wrenched all the metal he could wrench free from the chamber, visualizing them shaving themselves off into small knives. Knives were easy to imagine. He'd used plenty of them hunting beasts before, so within seconds, he had forty mana's worth of metal knives floating in the air behind him. He flung his gauntlet at the demon. Fire! The demon tried to turn.

He tried to lift his blade-arms, forcing the astral lead to regenerate into a shield or a halberd or another weapon that could protect him, but there were just too many knives. All two dozen or so knives struck the demon from the front, and he staggered as the knives tore through his chest, shoulders, ribs, and throat, eviscerating him. Black-silver blood sprayed into the weakened gravity, hanging in the air before drifting apart. And for the first time, Orland's eyes widened behind his mask.

The demon's wounds weren't regenerating. He's hit his limit! So even astral lead can't sustain a demon in battle forever! He'd seen it in beasts before: that instant when the body had spent everything it had, and when rage still remained but strength had finally gone thin. The demon knew it too. Something almost like fear cut through those dull black-silver madness in his eyes, but still he lowered his head, dragging raspy breaths into his eviscerated chest.

"Hero…" Then the demon charged with all four horns lowered, attempting to gore Orland in one last desperate attempt to win. Orland could just dash out of the way and let the demon eventually trip over himself, but would the 'Hero' do that?

"Stand your ground," the young girl whispered in his ear.

"Don't fear the lead." He sucked in a deep breath and raised both hands. Ten mana's worth of scrap metal wrapped around his left fist. Ten mana's worth of scrap wrapped around his right gauntlet. That was all the mana he had left, but that was all the mana he needed as the demon crashed into him—and he caught the horns head on. The impact drove him back, his boots carving lines through dust and ore chips, and his shoulders screamed as the force tried to fold him in half.

Still he growled through his teeth and held on, tightening his grip on the horns. I'm… not… running! He twisted his hips, yanked the horns sideways, and used the demon's own charge against him. The demon's hooves left the ground. Orland stepped under the momentum, wrangled the horns over his shoulder, and then flipped the four-horned demon fully over his head. The demon slammed into the ground hard enough to crack it. At the same time, Orland felt his songiron bands tugging.

Without looking, he snapped his gauntlet back and caught the pickaxe Miriyela threw at him, and then he swung down at the demon's chest with a shout. He supposed he did still have one mana left in his bank, so he smashed his pickaxe down with more force than usual, driving the demon's heart into the ground with a brutal crack. … But for one breath, Orland thought the demon would still get up. The bastard had grown arms from stumps, weapons from meat, and lead from pain.

It would be just like a demon to spit on the ground and drag himself up without a heart just to make Orland hit him again. Fortunately, the four-horned demon could only cough black-silver flakes out of his mouth, and that was when Orland finally allowed himself to stagger back, letting go of his pickaxe. He was completely out of mana, and damnit, that horn grab was a pretty stupid move in hindsight.

He may have had more levels in might with his upgraded gauntlet, and the demon may have been extremely weakened, but the demon was still nearly twice his size at the end. If the demon had a better angle with the charge, the 'Hero' would've died twice in the same month. But he'd gambled. And he'd won again. Miriyela reached him before his knees could buckle, supporting him with one armored arm. Sharsana curled around his legs as well, standing between him and the fallen demon as though he was still in danger.

He wasn't, but he appreciated the thought. The demon was in an even worse state than he was—so he was surprised when the demon still managed to speak.

"Ah," the demon rasped.

"What a cruel, cruel boy you are." Orland stayed quiet. The demon's cracked lips twitched around another cough, and more lead flakes spilled over his chin.

"To defy even the fate of our prophet is truly unforeseeable, but I suppose… that is why you are the Hero," he whispered. His gaze drifted past Orland, up towards the chamber ceiling where loose stones still floated under the rift's weakened gravity.

"Still, with you, Borzhan, and with you, Malka… I would have liked to see the promised land for all demonkind. Fields of lead, life without death…" Then his eyes lost focus.

"The King's salvation… promised…" The final word left the demon as a thin exhale, and at last, the astral lead in his wounds stopped trying to regenerate him. For a little while, Orland just stared at the demon. Then a roar tore him back to reality, and all three of them whirled. The giant sunmane lion stood before the rift, and every other demon in the chamber was dead. Orland had to admit, he hadn't been paying attention at all, but the lion had torn through the rest of the elkkin demons like paper.

Broken bodies were left across the stone, splattered against the walls. Black-silver blood drifted in the warped gravity, and they glimmered in the rift light, making the lion seem even brighter than it already was. And now that every demon in the chamber was slaughtered, the lion fixed its three crimson eyes on Orland. Oh, it was definitely still furious at him. It was fair, honestly. He'd dropped a giant tree on its head.

But then another rumble shook the entire chamber, and the rift behind the lion pulsed, the reddish-purple edges shuddering and threatening to close on all of them. Right on time. So he stepped forward slowly despite Miriyela and Sharsana both trying to hold him back, and he put an anxious grin on his face as he met the lion's gaze head-on.

"Now that the rift's no longer being forced to grow faster than it should, I'm guessing the invasion plan has failed!" he shouted, jabbing a gauntleted finger at the rift behind the lion.

"I'm pretty sure the Tyrant's closing the rifts one by one now, so you've got a choice to make! You could stay and kill us, but if you do that, you'll miss your chance to leave through the rift and be stuck down here for who knows how long! I bet there aren't enough demon corpses around to fill your stomach for more than a few days, so… what'll it be, then?" Orland clenched his gauntlet into a fist, steeling his eyes.

"Fight us and die of starvation yourself, or run and live to fight another day?" The lion's lips peeled back from its teeth. Orland's grin sharpened, refusing to back off. … Then, slowly, the lion turned its head around. Its claws dug into the stone, and its mane flared gold as it tore the rift wider, expanding the opening just enough for it to pass through by itself. Mere seconds later, the rift winked shut, and everything fell.

Stones, wooden splinters, ore chunks, rivers of blood, and all the floating debris that'd been hanging under the weakened gravity dropped at once. The chamber exploded into a cascade of crashes, cracks, and sharp impacts, making Orland yelp and throw his arms over his head. Miriyela immediately dragged him closer under the protection of her hammer's haft while Sharsana curled low with a growl.

At the same time, the only source of light in the chamber—the rift itself—vanished immediately, and pitch-black darkness swallowed them all. It was only after the debris stopped raining down around them—and the last pebbles stopped rolling across the ground—that Orland finally let out a quiet breath.

"... Miriyela?" he whispered.

"Yes, Great Hero?" she replied beside him.

"You still got that manalight lantern?" There was a rustle of armor. A small clink of metal. A moment later, pale blue light filled the chamber. Three weeks later, Kazimir rode into Zimnerudik alone. The astral lead storm may have lifted a while ago, and every rift reported by the Rift Sealing Corps in the region may have sealed themselves not long after the storm faded, but that hadn't meant the crisis was over.

Plenty of Common-Grade and Uncommon-Grade demons had still managed to make it through the rifts, which meant Kazimir had been going from settlement to settlement, dragging demons out of granaries, chapels, and old wells to make sure none remained in the region. There were still more to hunt. There were always more demons. But on the night of the twenty-first day after the storm lifted—just last night—Nikolai had sent word to him that something strange was happening in Zimnerudik.

Apparently, there was a loud rumbling sound coming from inside the mine, and it was getting closer and closer to the entrance. Kazimir had been planning on riding to Charsovo to help the local Rift Sealing Corps finish off their batch of demons, but when he'd heard Nikolai's call, he'd turned his horse around at once. Now it was daybreak. He'd traveled through the entire night, and by the time he rode through Zimnerudik's outer streets, the entire town was already gathered in the square.

Miners, soldiers, mothers, and children all clustered around the caved-in mine entrance behind the well. Nikolai and several soldiers hurried to meet him the moment he dismounted, landing lightly on his good leg.

"Captain Kazimir!" Nikolai saluted.

"Good to see you again! I've heard the tales of your many exploits from Velisk to Sisenka, and I must say, I—""Report," Kazimir interrupted bluntly, scowling as he stepped into the square himself.

"What's going on with the mine entrance?" The younger soldier hesitated a moment before looking at the mine entrance himself.

"Since six hours and twenty-four minutes ago, we've detected heavy rumbling coming from inside the mine. It's not the sounds of a collapse. It's more like… digging sounds." Another heavy rumble sounded, and the rubble at the cave-in started to shift. The whole square went quiet this time. For his part, Kazimir wrapped one hand around the handle of his blade, narrowing his eyes.

"Get everyone to back off," he said sternly. Nikolai repeated the order at once, louder. The soldiers immediately started to pull the townsfolk away. Miners dropped their tools and retreated, while mothers dragged their children behind them. Even the old men who'd picked up blades and arms listened without complaint. Another rumble came. Closer. Then another, and another, and five more minutes passed with the entire town holding its breath.

Kazimir didn't draw his blade, but his hand stayed on the handle as the cave-in exploded outwards, dust blasting across the square in a thick wave. The townsfolk cried out and shielded their faces, and so did the soldiers raise arms and turn away, but Kazimir didn't move. He only squinted and stared through the dust cloud, waiting for horns, claws, or some fresh piece of bad news. But when the dust thinned and sunlight fell over Zimnerudik once more, three figures staggered out of the mine.

Princess Miriyela of Kamengrad emerged first, broad and bloodied and clad in her molescale armor. She shook loose stone debris from one shoulder, lifted her chin towards the sunlight, and set her warhammer across her back as she waved the rest of the dust cloud away. Then came Sharsana the moledrake, huffing and puffing and swishing her tail to do the same. Finally, a boy in a golden mask coughed his way out, muttering curses under his breath while dragging empty sacks of food and drinks behind him.

The whole square stared at the three of them for a good while, and the three of them stared back, seemingly stunned by their welcoming party. Then the boy put on a bright and brazen grin, raising his gauntleted fist.

"... You called for a great slayer?" And so cheers erupted, shouts and cries of relief tearing through Zimnerudik hard enough to rattle entire windows. The soldiers roared, the women clapped furiously, and the children screamed the Hero's name. Even Nikolai looked as though he might salute or faint. Within seconds, the entire town had surged forward, lifting the boy onto their shoulders despite his startled protest and Miriyela's booming laughter.

The boy, of course, immediately spotted Kazimir standing at the back of the crowd, so the first thing he did was grin and give a shameless thumbs-up. Kazimir stared back. Then without a word, he sighed, turned around, and began walking towards the town hall. He needed sleep. He needed alcohol, actually—but more importantly, he just didn't really want the brat to see him smiling to himself.