Till this moment, Soren's heart had not ceased its climb.

How could it?

Still, he had to control himself. After all, he had learned one or two things from the Discipline of Sorrow.

Excitement was not one's friend at a time when caution should be wedded.

"Ahhh!!!" Ratler screamed.

He stepped into a pond, and now his foot was trapped.

The liquid climbed his ankle—fast.

He pulled, but it was no use.

Vinegar turned sharply.

Immediately flinging her grappling rig.

It wrapped around the short fat man. She tugged at it, yanking him out.

"Handler, please look after Raftler." Vinegar asked. This task was usually hers when they were in the Glass, but today, she had someone else to guide.

Handler nodded, pulling Ratler closer by his tail.

Surprisingly, Slacker was still reading the map behind. Yet, Soren noticed his feet did not make the same mistakes Ratler did.

They reached a ridge and stopped.

Only then did a thought strike Soren. They had said they were going to mine in the Glass.

Yet he didn't remember anyone bringing digging implements like axes or shovels.

What were they going to dig with? Their teeth?

Then he noticed Vinegar's concentration.

"What are we waiting for?" he asked.

Vinegar didn't look at him. Her eyes were fixed on the sky fractures above. "Bait." She replied.

The word had barely left her lips when—

Wuuuhummmm...

The sound spread through the Glass like a pressure wave.

Soren turned.

From the Crack they had entered through, something vast was emerging.

A Soul Mecha.

It descended feet-first, its mass displacing reality around it.

The Glass warped beneath its arrival, the ground dimpling as if under impossible weight before hardening again.

It stood at least a hundred meters tall.

A towering humanoid colossus forged from layered soul-steel plating.

Its surface was painted in deep crimson and obsidian black, the colors matte but alive, and faint sigils were pulsing beneath the armor like a second heartbeat.

Its frame was built for war.

Soren stared at it like a man at the altar, gaze fixed on his beautiful bride.

He swallowed as his eyes traced and spotted the specs of this mechanical wonder.

Broad shoulders housing rotating gyroscopic stabilizers, ringed with vented exhaust ports that leaked thin streams of blue-white Aether vapor.

Aside from that, along its limbs ran exposed conduction veins.

These were transparent channels where compressed Aether flowed in visible currents, constantly adjusting balance and output.

Its head, which housed the pilot, was narrow and angular and crowned with a multi-lens sensor array that flickered headlights.

Strapped along its back, magnetically locked in place, rested its primary weapon:

A lance.

It looked longer than the train that once promised to bring Soren to the academy.

Ironically, that was the name of this Soul Mecha and its Shade.

The Lance of the Red Silence.

I–05 Lancer Class Soul Mecha

Soren's chest tightened.

But there was more. The moment the mecha arrived, the Glass reacted.

Every Eldritch soul in sight—those wandering forms that had ignored them moments ago—stopped.

Then, as one, they turned.

All attention locked onto the mecha.

It was the same thing when Soren piloted the Soul Mecha back in his hometown.

They were somehow always attracted to Soul Mechas.

But this was still the beginning.

From a larger fracture in the sky came Whales.

But not as Soren knew them in books he had read. Not as they were in the oceans of earth.

These creatures were vast, each easily larger than the mecha itself, their bodies stretching hundreds of meters long as they forced themselves through the sky.

Wuuuhummmm

Their call reverberated in challenge.

Their flesh rippled like wet stone, translucent in places, revealing slow-turning organs that glowed faintly.

Some had multiple heads, fused together at impossible angles, mouths opening in silent, mournful cries that pressed against Soren's skull rather than his ears.

Any person with a shade felt it.

Some whales looked… broken.

As if they were weeping, streams of luminous fluid trailed from lidless eyes and dissolved into mist before reaching the ground.

Embedded along their bodies were stones—jagged growths of crystal and mineral in violent colors: emerald, sickly yellow, rusty red, etc...

The whales surged forward, swimming through the air toward the mecha with terrifying momentum.

The Soul Mecha moved.

With deliberate precision, it reached back.

Magnetic locks disengaged with a thunderous clack, and the lance slid into its grasp.

The weapon hummed as Aether flooded its channels, runes igniting one by one along its length.

The mecha lowered its stance, one foot grinding into the earth, stabilizers roaring to life.

A warrior's posture.

Handler didn't wait to see the impact.

"We move," he barked. "People—go, go, go!"

Prisoners utilized their methods, shooting towards the Whales.

Some literally flew there, and some used propellers.

Vinegar grabbed Soren, pulling him close in a hug.

The scent of her hair blew into his nose again.

"Hold on tight." She spoke, interrupting his thoughts.

Before he could respond, she flung her arm upward.

The grappling rig screamed as it fired.

The hook tore through the air, arcing impossibly high—then latched onto the hide of one of the passing whale-Eldritchs, biting into flesh that rippled like liquid stone.

The line went taut.

In the next instant, the rig yanked them off the ground.

The world dropped away beneath Soren as they were dragged into the sky, hurtling toward the chaos above, toward the screaming whales.

"Ahhh!" He screamed in reflex, clutching Vinegar by the waist.

Behind them, Ratler cackled wildly, dragged along by Handler and Slacker.

The moment they got to the Whale, it was as if the creature's body had its own gravity—even upside down, Soren and the others did not fall.

Soren panicked. Once more, the world had turned upside down.

"You can let go now," Vinegar teased.

Realising how tight he was holding on to her, he backed away.

Embarrassed.

He crouched down, breathing hard. His stomach turned again, but there was nothing to spit out.

"God of the bloody Neuralink... How... How is this possible?" He turned to Vinegar, feet still shaky.

She giggled lightly, finding his reaction cute.

"Trust me, the interesting part is just starting." She pointed to the huge pulsing yellow rock behind him.

It was the size of a boulder, a bit taller than soren.

Soren turned.

She walked up to it and touched it. Instantly it changed, becoming bland iron.

But this was not iron.

Soren's eyes widened in realization.

How could he not know it?

This was the ore for Soul steel.

(Author's note: Gifts are highly welcomed. Thank you.)

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