The God of Iron watched me with an expression that sat somewhere between approval and outright amusement. The look suited him; a quiet spark of mirth tucked behind eyes old enough to have watched mountains erode. One of the golden bulls beside him snorted softly, the sound deep and mellow, almost like a laugh muffled through a chest the size of a cottage. The echo carried through the Heaven of Iron with an ease that made the entire place feel alive. Even the floor seemed to hum, a low, steady vibration that suggested the world here breathed differently.

  The air itself had weight. Not oppressive, but dense with purpose. Warmth drifted in slow waves from the countless training pits and racks of impossible weights that filled the endless hall. Each clang of metal against stone rolled through the space like a heartbeat. Angels moved in the distance with the same calm strength as seasoned champions, their muscles shifting beneath simple cloth wraps as they lifted, pressed, and strained against objects any mortal would call impossible. Nothing here was ornamental. Everything was built for effort.

  “Well,” he said, “let us begin with the hammer turtle.”

  His voice rumbled through the hall like a steady drum, and for a brief moment the angels paused mid-exercise, not out of fear or reverence, but out of habit. As if even divinity deserved the courtesy of attention before they continued their sets.

  His smile widened a little, both amused and oddly fond. “I know you tried to be kind. Really, I do. But it was extremely entertaining watching you try to punch a turtle to death with that tiny body of yours.”

  Heat crawled up my neck. I opened my mouth. Closed it again. There was no argument in any corner of the world that could make that sound less ridiculous.

  “You trained exactly the way you should have,” he continued. “You took your training text and followed it to the letter. Discipline is rare in children and rarer still in reincarnators who think they know everything. I am proud of that. Truly. But Azolo, you are three. Even with every grain of strength your little frame could muster, you could stand there for a thousand lifetimes and it would still not be enough.”

  He lifted one hand and mimicked a gentle tap against the air, though the gesture alone sent a ripple of pressure rolling across the marble-like floor. “Your fight would have lasted forever. Truly forever. You could have punched that turtle until Greta wandered over, sighed at the situation, and dispatched it for you. And then she would have scooped you up under one arm and carried you home while you sulked.”

  I winced. That was painfully believable.

  He inclined his head as if agreeing with my reaction. “Right now you are simply not strong enough. Not with your body as it is. That does not mean you will remain that way. Strength grows. Bone thickens. Muscle learns. Your core will shape you, but only if you keep training. You will get better, Azolo. Much better. But as you are now, if you tried to fight anything with just your body, it would take you a thousand lifetimes to kill it. Even the hammer turtle. Especially the hammer turtle. Your body alone is not yet a weapon.”

  “It would have been discouraging,” he said. “Deeply discouraging. If I had let you fight it unaided and I thought it was better to let you feel what it was like for your body to get stronger.” He paused, rubbing his chin with the faintest frown. “But perhaps I helped a little too much. That stomp was brutal. More brutal than I intended, actually.”

  I blinked. “Helped how.”

  He gestured lazily at nothing in particular, though the air itself shimmered faintly where he moved. “A touch. The tip of my pinky. No one in your world would ever notice if I pressed down just enough to make poor squishy here a little more… compliant.”

  He rolled his shoulders, amusement crackling across his expression like sparks from a forge. “And yes, I cheat a little. I enjoy seeing how much I can tilt the scales without the other gods noticing. There is a small amount I can do if it looks natural enough. A nudge here, a tap there, and no one questions it. Subtlety is very powerful when everyone else assumes you are behaving.”

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  The faintest laughter drifted through the hall, and I realized it was coming from an angel doing pullups on a bar thick as a tree trunk, listening without looking.

  I blinked at the god. “Why would you cheat.”

  He looked genuinely offended. “You read my instructions, did you not. The ones written in the church text.”

  I frowned. “There were instructions. I saw the tenets.”

  He groaned loud enough that the bulls flicked their ears. “Azolo. There is a full text. It includes proper practices for building a stronger body. One of those practices is called Cheat Day. Because your body needs rest. Growth. Recovery. Enjoyment. Cheat Day is very important.”

  He lifted his chin with pride. “And as it happened, your first kill landed exactly on my cheat day. So I cheated.”

  “Squishy,” I repeated.

  “Yes. Squishy,” he said with absolute seriousness. “For what god would bother watching the struggles of a random three year old with no magic. It was a risk, but a calculated one.”

  A soft scraping sound drew my attention. A small shape emerged from behind the god’s massive leg. A hammer turtle no larger than a frying pan plodded out, its shell gleaming with divine polish. The light from above caught on its ridges, turning its shell into a mosaic of soft gold and earthy brown. It stared directly at me with slow, simmering judgment. Its gaze carried the weight of every lifetime it believed I had stolen from it. My spine snapped straight. My breath hitched.

  In my mind I whispered, I respected you. You were a worthy opponent.

  The turtle nodded. A single slow, devastating nod. Then a fresh head of crisp lettuce appeared beside it in a puff of warm light, and the turtle immediately abandoned all thoughts of vengeance to munch happily.

  My confusion sharpened. “Why intervene at all. And why is there a hammer turtle in your heaven that looks exactly like the one I killed.”

  He straightened his posture and folded his arms, a faint note of embarrassment flickering across his face. “Ah. That. Squishy was a valiant warrior who fought bravely.”

  I stared at him.

  He stared back.

  “I do not buy that.”

  The God of Iron sighed. “The truth is, I felt a bit bad when we made him go squish. So I brought his pseudo soul here. A small echo. A memory. Not a true life. But enough that he can wander my halls without being too upset about his previous fate.”

  I had absolutely no idea how to respond to that. The floor beneath my feet hummed in sympathy, or maybe it was just the constant rhythm of distant weights dropping. Hard to tell.

  He did not give me time to try.

  “Now,” he continued, “as for your next question. Did I help you in the fight with Oliver.”

  I braced for an answer I was not sure I wanted. I had been debating whether to ask, and well, he was a god. It seemed sensible that he would know what was on my mind. Mostly because I was not trying to hide it from him, and this was his heaven. Who knew what powers he held here.

  He lifted one finger. “Only a little. And not in the way you think.”

  “How,” I asked.

  “I made Randall sneeze,” he said. “Just once. Held him back for a moment. If he had reached the door sooner, he would have stopped you from stopping Oliver. And then the firestorm would have erased the entire building. So I made sure he paused.”

  I stared at him. “You made him sneeze.”

  He nodded without shame. “Yes. Technically it was still my cheat day. But mostly, no one notices something that small. A mortal instructor sneezing is beneath divine awareness. It is safe to slip in a little interference when it looks that harmless.”

  I rubbed my face. “So then why was I so much faster than them.”

  The god chuckled. The sound rolled through the hall like warm thunder. “Azolo, you have been training nonstop since you were placed in that body. You move like someone who refuses to waste effort. You are leaner and stronger than any three year old I have ever heard of. And you are a staff master. A real one. Not a child swinging a stick. Add to that your training staff with its very simple reinforcement and weight reduction circuits, and of course you moved faster. Of course you hit harder.”

  He shrugged, a gesture that made the air ripple again. “And you were fighting incompetent children. That helped quite a bit.”

  I let out a slow breath. That explanation was annoyingly reasonable. I almost wanted something divine to blame, something that would excuse the harm I had caused. But no. When it was all lined up. It was on me.

  The God of Iron watched the realization settle across my expression. His smile softened, only slightly, the warmth of it cutting through the intimidating presence he carried like an armor of living stone.