Blueprints!

Time was always ticking, and Damien who was constantly battling a fight against time knew that even now despite the celebratory atmosphere, he couldn't afford to slack off.

Fortunately, before long, the celebration outside had turned into a low, the rhythmic hum of snoring dwarves and crackling bonfires resounded through the air.

While the city slept off the victory, a smaller, soberer gathering was taking place inside the secured workshop of the Old Clocktower.

Damien sat at a metal table, a piece of charcoal in his hand. Opposite him sat the new Prince Regent, Hephaestus, and the Grandmaster Artificer, Brokk.

Standing behind Damien were his shadow executives: Barnaby, clutching his golden abacus, and Cipher, blending into the corner.

"So," Brokk grunted, wiping grease from his mechanical eye. "You saved the King. You killed the dragon. You saved the city. By Dwarven law, we owe you a life debt. But knowing you, kid, you probably don't want a debt. You want a contract."

"I want a partnership," Damien corrected, sketching rapid lines on a large sheet of parchment.

"Grandmaster, you built the Ironclads in a month. You turned scrap metal into an army. That proves one thing: Ironforge has the production capacity to conquer the world."

"Aye," Hephaestus nodded, his eyes shining. "If we mass-produce the Guardians—"

"No Guardians," Damien interrupted. He drew a large 'X' over a diagram of a war-bot.

"War is profitable, yes. But war ends. And when war ends, soldiers stop buying swords."

Damien slid the parchment across the table.

It wasn't a drawing of a tank or a golem. It was a drawing of a vehicle based on his memories of Blue Star. Low to the ground. Sleek curves. Four wide wheels. An exposed engine block.

"I don't want to sell weapons to the Empire," Damien said calmly. "I want to sell them... envy."

"Envy?" Hephaestus blinked, looking at the sketch. "It's a carriage. But where are the horses?"

"There are no horses," Damien tapped the drawing of the engine block. "The power comes from inside. It needs to be fast. Faster than a Griffin. And it needs to be loud. I want the ground to shake when it starts."

Brokk frowned, pulling the paper closer. He adjusted his mechanical eye, scanning the crude drawing.

"No horses..." Brokk muttered. He looked at Hephaestus. "If we use a kinetic drive shaft connected to the wheels... and power it with a Mana-Combustion chamber..."

"We'd need a high-torque conversion," Hephaestus interrupted, his eyes suddenly lighting up as the engineering challenge took hold. He grabbed a quill and started drawing complex runes over Damien's simple sketch.

"If we scale down the Titan's reactor... no, that's too unstable. We use liquid mana injection. Explosive bursts to drive the pistons."

"Aye," Brokk nodded, catching on. "But the vibration would shatter a wooden chassis. We'd need a Mithril-Steel alloy frame to handle the stress. And the heat dissipation..."

"Runes of Frost on the intake valves," Hephaestus countered, sketching furiously. "And we route the exhaust through the back to create that 'loud' sound he wants."

Damien watched them work, a satisfied smile on his face. He didn't know how to build an engine, but he knew the Dwarves couldn't resist a puzzle.

"We'll call it the 'Phantom Type-1'," Damien said. "Leather seats. Climate control runes. Pure luxury."

"But what is the point?" Brokk asked, looking up from the now-complex schematic. "Teleportation is instant. Why drive?"

"Status," Barnaby spoke up from behind Damien, his eyes widening as his Golden Abacus ability flared to life.

"The Young Master is right," Barnaby whispered, his hands trembling. "Nobles don't buy things because they are useful. They buy them because their neighbor doesn't have one. If we make this expensive... if we make it exclusive... every Duke in the Human Empire will kill to own one."

"Exactly," Damien nodded. "We aren't selling transportation. We are selling speed. We are selling ego."

"Fine," Brokk grunted, though he looked intrigued by the mechanical challenge. "We build your toy cars. Is that it?"

"No," Damien flipped the paper over. "That's for the men. This... is for the masses."

He drew a simple box projecting a beam of light onto a flat surface.

"The Memory Projector."

"Illusion magic?" Brokk scoffed. "We have that. Mages use it to send messages."

"Not messages," Damien shook his head. "Stories."

"I want to record plays. Adventures. Romances. But not just static images. I want sound. Music. Emotion. We build the projectors here, set up theaters in every major city, and charge a copper coin for entry."

"A copper?" Cipher spoke from the shadows. "That's nothing."

"A copper from one person is nothing," Damien said. "A copper from ten million people... every week... forever?"

The room went silent.

Barnaby dropped his abacus. "Billions," he squeaked. "It's an infinite gold mine."

"And it's propaganda," Damien added, his voice turning cold. "We control the stories. We control what the people see. If the Second Prince tries to brand us traitors, we release a 'movie' showing him burning orphanages. We win the war before it even starts."

Brokk stared at Damien. The mechanical eye whirred, zooming in on the boy's face.

"You..." Brokk shook his head, a mixture of fear and admiration in his voice. "You are more dangerous than your father. Theron just killed people. You? You want to own their minds."

"That's the plan," Damien stood up. "Ironforge becomes the factory. The Black Thread becomes the distributor. We split the profits 60-40."

"50-50," Brokk countered instantly.

"55-45," Damien shot back. "And I'll provide raw materials from the Dragon Lands."

"Deal," Brokk spat on his hand and extended it.

Damien shook it. The mana in the room sealed the pact.

"Now," Damien said, adjusting his coat. "I have a dragon to find."

"Wait," Hephaestus stood up. He exchanged a look with Brokk. A sly, secretive grin spread across the Prince's soot-stained face.

"Before you go, Voss... we have a proposition."

"Oh?"

"You're going to the Dragon Lands," Brokk said, crossing his massive arms. "You're going to get us Dragon Blood, Dragon Bone, and Dragon Scales."

"If I survive," Damien amended.

"When you come back," Hephaestus corrected him. "Bring us the best materials you find. The Heart-Scales of an Ancient. The horns of a Fire-Lord."

"Why?"

Brokk pointed at the sketch of the Mana-Car.

"Because that toy you drew? That's for humans. That's for nobles who want to look pretty."

Brokk leaned in, his gold tooth flashing.

"If you bring us the materials... we will have a 'Prototype' waiting for you by the time you get back."

"Something that doesn't just drive fast," Hephaestus added, his eyes gleaming with the madness of a true inventor. "Something that moves like the wind!"

Damien looked at the two master smiths. He imagined what a vehicle built by the creators of the Titan and the Pantheon Sword would look like if given dragon parts as fuel.

He smiled.

"I'll bring you the whole damn dragon if I have to."

"Good," Brokk slapped the table. "Now get out of my workshop. We have an economy to revolutionize."

Damien turned to leave, signaling Barnaby and Cipher to stay and begin the work.

As he walked out into the cool night air of the Scrapyard, he looked up at the artificial stars.

The foundation was laid. He had the money. He had the army. He had the tech.

Now, he just needed the power to hold it all.

"Western Dragon Lands," Damien whispered, looking at the horizon. "Here I come."

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