The trek back to the Assembly was a slog. Trenn’s golden tail carved a trench through the earth, the grinding of metal scales on stone a rhythmic friction against his spine.

  Mara stepped over the furrow, her attention fixed on the raptor talons protruding from her satchel.

  “Almitad,” she said, her voice cutting through the quiet. “The Gem-Croc grew when it ate the turtle god’s blood. It absorbed the mass.”

  She pointed a finger at Trenn’s back as he ducked under a low-hanging branch. “He bleeds ichor like them. If he eats god-meat, does he get bigger?”

  Trenn stopped. His tail swung through a cluster of ferns with the sound of a scythe.

  Almitad’s colorful mask tilted slowly to the side. She looked at Trenn, at his massive tail, then back to his face. The green fire in her ribs pulsed once, a slow, thoughtful beat.

  “The god would grow, but Trenn would shrink. You have two souls fighting over dominion of the same body. Do not feed the parasite.”

  Trenn lost his footing. He swallowed it down.

  "I’m not feeding this thing. Ever."

  Mara scoffed. “We know what your promises are worth.”

  Trenn recoiled, but Almitad floated closer, the green-black light of her bloom reflecting in the raw gemstones of his tail.

  "Does this ascension extend to your Arcana? Your Wild Mage spells... do they still feel like yours?"

  "I don’t know," he whispered. The image of the Wolf Kin settlement flashed in his mind. The Grey-Fur collapsing. "But I spoke a word, and my enemy’s heart stopped."

  He shuddered and gripped Mara’s hand.

  "It took something. A piece of myself vanished when he died, replaced by the instinct. The need. To kill. To be… the only one? The last one? I’m not sure."

  Mara’s arm stiffened. “Are you even Trenn anymore?”

  “No, he is—”

  Dawn’s crow shattered the conversation.

  The echo hammered against them, louder than before. It rattled his teeth. It vibrated in the hollows of his sinuses. Every step became a fight against the noise.

  But the loudest sound wasn't the god’s cry; it was a memory.

  “DIE.”

  The command echoed in his skull, overlapping with the rooster’s scream.

  He remembered the Grey-Fur’s face. The light vanished from his eyes. No struggle. No wound. Just obedience to Trenn's will.

  A wave of nausea rolled in his gut, sour and hot. He stumbled, catching himself on a skeletal tree trunk. The wood hummed against his palm, vibrating in sympathy with the rooster’s sonic assault.

  "Trenn?" Mara’s voice was a shout, barely audible over the echoes.

  He kept his head down. "I liked it," he confessed to the dirt. "Crushing them. It felt right."

  He squeezed Mara’s hand.

  "They were monsters raiding a village. But I didn't just kill them. I wrecked part of the town. And I enjoyed it."

  Mara stepped into his vision, her amber eyes hard.

  "You're a weapon, Trenn. You’ve been one since you set foot in the Mana Forest. And weapons don't have morals. They have targets.”

  “And your target is the One-Eye," said Almitad, floating a few steps behind.

  The words stuck in his mind. It caused fear and anger.

  The One-Eye.

  The terrain grew rocky, the vegetation sparse.

  "The One-Eye is close," Mara pointed to a Tear of Dawn. “They glow brightest at the beginning of their trail.”

  Trenn closed his eyes. The greyscale map of the valley unfolded—trees, rocks, the Goat Kin city, built along the cliff-face of a quarry. His perception swept past the desolate wheat fields, and found the canyon mouth.

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  It breathed. With every crow, a physical blast of air erupted from the opening, a shockwave that scoured the fields and hammered an abandoned wall of the Quarry with dust. Homes closer to the ground were already crumbling under the sonic assault.

  Trenn gasped, severing the connection.

  The silence of the mist felt heavy after the screaming chaos.

  "It's a sonic cannon," he whispered, rubbing his temples. "The Mana Source amplifies the sound until every crow turns into a flying wall. They would pulp a body in seconds."

  "Why did the One-Eye even go there?" Mara asked, wincing. "If he stops crowing, we’re on him. He’s backed himself into a corner."

  ***

  The Assembly vibrated with the deafening heartbeat of the steam hammers. In a secluded maintenance bay commandeered by the resistance, Ezy tightened a bolt on a hydraulic piston with her massive skeletal hand.

  The new machine was a sight to behold.

  It possessed the predatory lines of a military prototype, far removed from the scavenged desperation of the Scrapper. The frame was Red Metal, forged in the Assembly’s foundries and reinforced with heavy steel plating shaped with obsessive precision.

  Spare parts—pistons, gears, and armor plates—were stacked high against the walls; Ezy had picked the best of what the production line crafted. But she wasn’t going to waste functional spare parts.

  For the first time since the Burrow, she wasn't building from scrap; she had a blueprint, resources, and a workforce. In the past, she had to manufacture each piece by herself.

  "Pass me the torsion wrench," Ezy said, her voice echoing in the metallic space.

  Zeen didn't answer immediately. He sat on a crate of Red Metal armor parts, holding a copper rivet between his thumb and forefinger. He squeezed.

  With a sharp snap, the rivet sheared.

  "Beautiful," Zeen whispered, tossing the broken pieces into a bin filled with thousands of identical, compromised fasteners.

  He handed Ezy the wrench. "The Rabbitling shift-boss confirmed the shipment. These crates go upstairs—to the Quarry—tomorrow."

  Zeen flashed a dark grin. "The Goat Kin strap the armor on their statues, the magic takes hold, the Golem rises..."

  He picked up another rivet. "One solid hit to the seam, and the sulfur-rich rivets snap. The plate falls, the enchantment breaks, and the Golem is immobilized."

  "It’s brilliant," Ezy admitted, cranking the wrench. "With the One-Eye distracted—"

  She paused. Even down here, you could hear Dawn’s crows. They resonated through the rock walls. "What about the Armored Dog?"

  "The scouts say it hasn’t left the mountain’s base in three days," Zeen confirmed, his expression darkening.

  "It digs until it passes out from exhaustion, wakes up an hour later, and starts tearing at the rock again. Its paws are raw meat, but it refuses to stop."

  He shook his head. "It’s trying to tunnel under the sound-wall to get to the Cave of Echoes."

  "Can it?" Ezy asked, lifting her head from her work.

  "No," Zeen said, checking the action on his soul-bound musket.

  "The acoustics in that canyon aren't just loud; they're deadly. If the Dog breaches the wall, the resonance will liquefy its brain before it takes three steps."

  Ezy looked at her new machine. It needed calibration, fuel, and the forearm rifles needed to be set in their firmpoints.

  "We can't breach it. Not without a counter-frequency. Almitad was right. We need a Sound Mage. We need Trenn."

  "Trenn is gone," Zeen snapped. "He’s lost in the mist, eating bugs and feeling sorry for himself. We do this without him."

  He walked over to her, his hand resting on the polished Red Metal of her machine.

  "We have this. We have sabotage. We have a dog god. Most of the Goat Kin and Rabbitling populations are on our side. We don't need a Wild Mage to win a war. We just—"

  The heavy iron door of the maintenance bay groaned. The latch lifted with a screech of rusted metal.

  Zeen spun, musket rising to his shoulder in a fluid motion. Ezy moved quickly, her skeletal hand reaching for her rifle as the door swung inward.

  Mara stood in the frame. Her black chitin armor was scored with fresh scratches, and her white fur was matted with dried blood that wasn't hers. She looked exhausted, battered, and angry.

  "Put the gun down, Zeen.”

  Zeen didn't lower the weapon. "You've been gone for hours. The Loyalist patrols are doubling. If you led them here—"

  "We weren’t followed," Mara interrupted, stepping aside. "But I did drag something out of the mud."

  She gestured into the hallway.

  A massive shape stepped into the light.

  Zeen’s musket wavered. Ezy lowered her rifle.

  The figure ducked to clear the doorframe. Bare chest scarred white, grease-stained rags at his waist, a gold-scaled tail carving a line in the dust.

  The scar running from ear to lip pulled his expression into a permanent, tragic grimace. Skate hummed on his head.

  He raised his hands, palms open.

  "I..." Trenn’s voice was rough, like grinding stones. He swallowed. "I was told we’re friends?"

  Zeen lowered the musket slowly, his mouth hanging open. Then his eyes hardened, and he lifted it back. “You’ve got nerve, abandoning us!”

  Trenn stared at the Gnomes, eyes flicking from Ezy’s eyepatch to the hardness in Zeen’s face.

  The woman’s scars sent a phantom jolt of heat through his skin. The man with the gun settled a heavy weight in his gut—a feeling of shared trenches and desperate odds.

  He tilted his head, studying them like a puzzle he couldn't quite solve, but felt drawn to solve.

  "You look like a nightmare," Zeen whispered.

  Almitad drifted in behind Trenn.

  "He is a nightmare. And an idiot. He is soulbound with a god."

  Trenn awkwardly scratched the back of his head. “I don’t even know what that means.”

  Silence.

  Ezy stepped forward, the metal joints of her leg clicking. She looked at the tail, at the gems, at the monster her friend had become.

  "Trenn?" she asked softly.

  Zeen, confused, lowered his weapon.

  Trenn looked at her. He looked at the machine behind her, then back at the fierce intelligence in her eye. A slow connection clicked into place behind his gaze—not a memory, but a feeling. Trust.

  "Mara says you need me.” He turned to Zeen. "To silence a rooster."

  Heads Up: Potential Schedule Adjustment

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