Chapter : 1805

  Its movements became sluggish, like it was moving through molasses. The rotary cannon spun slower and slower. The blue force field flickered and finally died, the generator overheating and shutting down to prevent an explosion.

  "Shield down!" Lloyd yelled, raising his fist. "Finish it!"

  He recalled Iffrit and Fang Fairy, wanting to deliver the final blow himself. The demon and the wolf spirit vanished, leaving Lloyd standing alone before the overheating giant.

  Lloyd prepared to strike, thinking the battle was won. But he had underestimated the Firefly Corporation’s engineering. They didn't build machines that just died quietly.

  Just as Lloyd stepped forward, a high-frequency vibration rippled through the machine’s chassis. The air around it began to warp.

  "Emergency Purge Initiated," the Mech croaked, its voice dropping an octave into a demonic bass. "Protocol: Overclock."

  BOOM.

  A massive shockwave of sonic energy exploded from the Mech’s armor. It wasn't an explosion of fire; it was a wall of sound. It hit Lloyd like a physical truck.

  The steel chains binding the vents shattered like glass. Lloyd was thrown backward, skidding across the concrete floor, tumbling end over end until he hit the far wall.

  He gasped, tasting blood. He looked up.

  The machine wasn't dead. The vents were open again, spewing black smoke. But the Mech was standing up straighter. The crimson mono-eye flickered, then changed color. It turned a violent, flickering purple.

  It was no longer just testing Lloyd. It was no longer following safety protocols.

  "Limiters Disengaged," the Mech roared. "Target Execution Mode: Active."

  Lloyd wiped his mouth and stood up, his legs shaking slightly. "Okay," he said, staring at the purple eye. "Now it's a fight."

  Refusing to let Lloyd breathe, the Mech's back panels slammed open again. This wasn't a standard volley; it was a desperate, full-magazine dump. Twelve homing missiles hissed out of the smoke, their boosters burning a jagged white-hot as they spiraled toward Lloyd with newfound aggression.

  The sound was unmistakable to anyone who had lived through a technological war, a sharp thwip-thwip-thwip of compressed air launching projectiles, followed immediately by the roar of solid-fuel boosters igniting. Smoke trails spiraled into the air, painting white streaks against the dark ceiling of the underground testing arena. These weren't the clumsy, mana-guided arrows Lloyd was used to seeing in this world. These were heat-seekers. Smart weapons. They didn't just fly; they hunted.

  Lloyd stood his ground, his hands in his pockets, watching the death swarm approach with a look of mild annoyance. He could see the tiny sensors on the nose cones of the missiles adjusting their flight paths, locking onto his thermal signature. They were correcting for wind, for gravity, for his potential movement. It was impressive engineering, really. It was almost a shame he had to break them.

  "Standard spread pattern," Lloyd noted, his voice calm amidst the rising roar of the engines. "They're trying to box me in. Create a kill zone where the splash damage overlaps. Cute."

  He didn't run. Running was for people who didn't understand physics. If he ran, the missiles would just turn. If he teleported, they would re-acquire. He needed to blind them. He needed to confuse their little electronic brains.

  "Iffrit," Lloyd said, his voice dropping an octave. "It's getting a little chilly in here. Turn up the thermostat."

  The air in the arena warped. It wasn't a subtle shift. It was a violent tearing of the atmospheric fabric. A pillar of crimson light erupted from the floor in front of Lloyd, screaming with the sound of a thousand burning souls. From the inferno, Iffrit emerged. The Demon King of Annihilation didn't look happy about being summoned to fight a machine, but he looked ready to break something.

  "A wall," Lloyd commanded, pointing at the incoming swarm. "Don't hit them directly. Just make it hot. Sun-surface hot."

  Iffrit grunted, a sound like tectonic plates grinding together. He didn't swing his massive sword. Instead, he opened his mouth and roared. A tidal wave of fire erupted, but it didn't travel forward in a beam. It swirled. It expanded. It formed a massive, rotating cyclone of super-heated plasma directly in the path of the missiles.

  This wasn't normal fire. This was Absolute Annihilation Fire. It didn't just burn; it consumed the air, the dust, and the very concept of "cool." The temperature in the arena spiked by a thousand degrees in a fraction of a second.

  The effect on the missiles was instantaneous and catastrophic.

  Chapter : 1806

  Guided missiles rely on delicate sensors. They rely on thermal imaging to find their target. When Iffrit’s firewall materialized, the ambient temperature became hotter than the target the missiles were tracking. Their sensors were flooded with white noise. They went blind.

  "Target lock lost," the Mech’s synthetic voice announced, sounding confused. "Thermal overload."

  The missiles panicked. Their guidance systems, overwhelmed by the sheer intensity of the heat blooming in front of them, tried to correct for a target that was suddenly everywhere at once. They wobbled. They spun. And then, the heat melted their internal gyroscopes.

  BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!

  The air detonated. Twelve high-explosive warheads triggered simultaneously, not on Lloyd, but fifty feet in the air, crashing into Iffrit’s wall of fire. The explosion was spectacular. Shrapnel flew everywhere, pinging harmlessly off the energy shields protecting the observation deck where King Liam stood. Smoke and fire mixed in a chaotic cloud, obscuring everything.

  Lloyd stood behind Iffrit, completely untouched. He brushed a speck of ash off his shoulder.

  Iffrit snorted, smoke curling from his nostrils. Metal flies. Annoying.

  "Don't relax yet," Lloyd warned. "That was just the opening act."

  The smoke began to swirl. Something big was moving through it. Something heavy. The ground vibrated with the rhythmic thud-thud-thud of heavy hydraulic steps.

  The Firefly Mech wasn't done. It didn't care about the smoke. It didn't need thermal sensors to know where Lloyd was standing. It had a memory. It had a last known position. And it was angry.

  Through the wall of dissipating fire, the crimson giant emerged. It moved with terrifying speed for something that weighed twenty tons. It lowered its shoulder, engaging its thrusters for a dash maneuver.

  "Here it comes," Lloyd muttered. "Close quarters."

  The Mech raised its right arm. A blade extended from the wrist housing. It wasn't a normal sword. It was a Vibro-Blade. The metal hummed with a high-pitched frequency that made Lloyd’s teeth ache. It was oscillating thousands of times a second. That kind of weapon didn't just cut; it separated matter at a molecular level. It could slice through tank armor like it was wet paper.

  Lloyd watched it come. He calculated the trajectory. He calculated the speed.

  He could use [Void Steps]. He could teleport to the other side of the room and laugh. He could summon Fang Fairy and dodge. He could use a hundred different tricks to avoid the hit.

  But King Liam was watching. This was a test. The King wanted to know if Lloyd could handle the physical reality of war, not just the magical one. He wanted to know if Lloyd could take a hit.

  "Fine," Lloyd whispered. "Let's see what this body can do."

  He dismissed Iffrit. The demon vanished, leaving Lloyd standing alone in the path of the charging juggernaut.

  Lloyd planted his feet. He took a deep breath, centering his core. He reached out with his mind, not to the spirits, but to the world around him. To the iron in the concrete floor. To the trace metals in the air. To the iron in his own blood.

  "[Steel Blood]," Lloyd commanded.

  Usually, he used this power to create chains. He used it to bind, to constrict, to attack from a distance. But that was external. Today, he was going internal.

  He pulled the power inward. He visualized his skin, his muscles, his bones. He commanded the iron to reinforce them. He commanded the mana to condense, to harden, to become a lattice of unbreakable density.

  His skin took on a faint, dark gray sheen. It didn't look like rock. It looked like polished, dark diamond. It was the ultimate defensive application of his bloodline.

  "Diamond-Toughness," Lloyd gritted out. "Maximum density."

  The Mech was on him. The Vibro-Blade slashed down, a blur of gray death aimed directly at his chest.

  Lloyd didn't flinch. He didn't try to parry. He raised his crossed forearms in a classic blocking stance.

  "Hit me," Lloyd challenged.

  The blade connected.

  CLANG.

  The sound was not the wet thud of metal hitting flesh. It was the ringing, bell-like impact of metal striking an anvil, amplified a thousand times. It was a sound that shattered the remaining windows in the observation booth high above.

  The force was unimaginable. The Vibro-Blade, humming with sonic destruction, slammed into Lloyd’s crossed forearms. The oscillation tried to vibrate his cells apart. The kinetic energy of a twenty-ton machine moving at sixty miles per hour tried to turn him into paste.

  The concrete floor beneath Lloyd’s feet didn't just crack; it pulverized. It exploded into dust.

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  Chapter : 1807

  Lloyd felt the impact travel through his arms, down his spine, and into his legs. It felt like catching a falling building. His bones groaned under the stress. His muscles screamed as they tore and instantly knit back together, held in place by the mana-infused iron in his blood.

  He didn't break.

  He slid.

  "Nngh!" Lloyd grunted, his teeth clenched so hard he thought they might crack.

  The force of the blow sent him skidding backward. His boots, reinforced with the same steel power, acted like plows. They carved two deep, jagged furrows into the reinforced concrete floor of the arena. Dust and sparks flew up in a rooster tail behind him.

  Ten feet. Twenty feet. Thirty feet.

  The Mech pushed, its engines screaming as it tried to follow through with the strike, trying to drive Lloyd into the ground.

  Lloyd held the block. He could feel the heat of the Vibro-Blade against his skin. The friction was incredible. His sleeves disintegrated instantly, burning away to reveal his arms.

  They weren't cut. They weren't bleeding. They were gleaming with that dark, metallic luster. The blade was grinding against his skin, throwing off showers of bright yellow sparks, but it couldn't bite. It couldn't find purchase.

  "Is that... all you've got?" Lloyd strained, his voice tight.

  He dug his heels in. He channeled more mana into his legs, increasing his density, increasing his weight. He became an immovable object.

  Forty feet. Fifty feet.

  He stopped.

  The skid ended. Lloyd stood there, fifty feet from where he had been hit, smoke rising from his boots and his arms. The Mech stood over him, its blade still pressed against his guard, its engine whining in protest.

  The machine seemed confused. Its logic processors couldn't understand why the soft biological target hadn't been bisected.

  "Target integrity... intact," the Mech synthesized, its voice glitching slightly. "Error. Weapon malfunction? No. Target density... exceeding parameters."

  Lloyd looked up. He was sweating. His arms throbbed with a dull ache that would probably turn into a bruise the size of a dinner plate tomorrow. But he was whole. He was alive.

  He slowly lowered his arms. He pushed the massive blade away with a casual shove.

  He looked at his forearms. There was no blood. There was no cut. Just a faint, silver metallic sheen where the blade had made contact, like a smudge of graphite on paper. He rubbed it with his thumb. It wiped off.

  Lloyd let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. He looked up at the observation deck, where King Liam was leaning over the railing, looking like he had just seen a magic trick he couldn't explain.

  Then, Lloyd looked back at the Mech. He smirked. It was the arrogant, sarcastic smirk of a man who knew he had just defied physics and won.

  "A bit slow on the refresh rate, isn't it?" Lloyd asked the machine.

  The Mech pulled its arm back, retracting the blade. It took a step back, its sensors whirring as it re-evaluated the threat level.

  "Threat reassessment," the machine said. "Target classification upgraded. Designation: Hard Target."

  "You think?" Lloyd scoffed. "I just tanked a sonic sword with my bare hands. I think 'Hard Target' is a bit of an understatement. You should try 'Boss Level'."

  He shook his arms out, feeling the circulation return. The [Steel Blood] ability receded, his skin returning to its normal color, though it still felt hot to the touch.

  "Okay," Lloyd said, cracking his neck. "You had your turn. You threw missiles. You brought a knife to a fistfight. You tried to turn me into roadkill."

  He looked at the machine. It was impressive. It was deadly. But it was just a machine. It was built by engineers who thought armor and shields were the answer to everything. They didn't account for a guy who could turn his blood into steel.

  "My turn," Lloyd said.

  He didn't summon a weapon yet. He just stood there, analyzing. The Mech was covered in armor plates. Heavy, composite armor designed to stop tank shells. But every machine had a weakness. Every design had a flaw.

  "James said this was a captured unit," Lloyd muttered to himself. "That means it's been repaired. Patched up. It's not factory fresh."

  He activated his eyes. Not the steel ones. The other ones.

  The world shifted. Colors faded away, replaced by lines of force and energy. He looked at the Mech, and he didn't see a monster anymore. He saw a schematic. He saw the flow of mana in its core. He saw the stress points in its joints.

  And he saw something else.

  Chapter : 1808

  "There you are," Lloyd whispered.

  The game had changed. He wasn't defending anymore. He was dissecting.

  Recognizing that the Mech’s armor is made of "Null-Alloy" that resists direct elemental attacks, Lloyd activates his [Blue Ring Eyes].

  The world instantly lost its color. The gray concrete, the red paint of the Mech, the bright lights of the arena—it all desaturated into a high-contrast world of black, white, and gray. But overlaid on top of this monochromatic reality were vibrant, pulsing lines of energy.

  Lloyd saw the world as a blueprint. He saw the ley lines in the earth. He saw the magical wards protecting the walls. And most importantly, he saw the internal workings of the Executioner Mk. IV.

  "Let's see what makes you tick," Lloyd murmured, his eyes—now black sclera with glowing blue rings—narrowing in focus.

  The Mech wasn't just metal. It was a complex web of mana conduits and electrical wiring. The armor plating, which looked solid to the naked eye, glowed with a dull, resistance field in Lloyd’s vision. That was the Null-Alloy. It was designed to disperse magical energy. If he hit it with a fireball, the fire would just splash off like water on a duck. If he hit it with lightning, the current would be grounded instantly.

  "Smart," Lloyd admitted. "Firefly knows how to fight mages. They built a tank that wears a magic-proof raincoat."

  But nothing was perfect. Entropy was the one law that even the Firefly Corporation couldn't bribe.

  Lloyd scanned the chassis. He ignored the big, flashy guns. He ignored the thick chest plate. He looked for the scars. He looked for the history of the machine.

  King Liam—James Khan—had said he repaired this thing. Repairs meant seams. Repairs meant patches.

  His gaze drifted to the back of the Mech, near the dorsal spine. There was a heat exchanger there, a massive vent designed to dump the excess thermal energy from the reactor.

  "Zoom in," Lloyd commanded his own brain.

  His vision magnified. He looked past the metal grate. He looked past the fans.

  There it was.

  Deep inside the primary cooling vent, buried under layers of machinery, was a hairline fracture. It was tiny. Microscopic. A legacy of whatever battle James Khan used to capture it five years ago. Maybe a lucky shot from a railgun, or a stress fracture from a hard landing. It had been welded shut, patched with a slightly different alloy, but the structural integrity wasn't 100%. It was maybe 98%.

  To anyone else, it was invisible. To Lloyd, it was a neon sign that said "INSERT EXPLOSION HERE."

  "Found you," Lloyd whispered.

  The Mech, sensing Lloyd’s stare, shifted its stance. It raised its rotary cannon again.

  "Target analyzing," the Mech droned. "Initiating suppression fire."

  "Too late," Lloyd said. "I've already read your diary."

  He needed to hit that crack. But he couldn't just hit it with a bullet. A bullet would bounce off the grate. He needed something that could pierce, but also something that could flow. He needed liquid fire delivered at the speed of light.

  He needed a fusion.

  "Nova," Lloyd called out in his mind. "I need the cannon. But we're going to try a new recipe today."

  The white light of the Nova spirit enveloped his right arm again, forming the massive, futuristic cannon. It hummed with its usual clean, clinical power.

  "Iffrit," Lloyd called to his other spirit. "I know you're tired of being a wall. How would you like to be a bullet?"

  A bullet? Iffrit’s voice rumbled in his head, sounding intrigued. I am a king, not a projectile.

  "You're a king who is going to melt a giant robot," Lloyd promised. "Just get in the gun."

  Acceptable, Iffrit grunted.

  "Fusion Protocol," Lloyd announced. "Spirit Synchronization: 100%."

  He didn't summon Iffrit’s physical body. Instead, he channeled the demon’s essence—his raw, concept-burning magma—directly into the Nova Cannon.

  Usually, the cannon fired white plasma. Pure, clean energy.

  But as Iffrit’s power flowed into the chamber, the white light changed. It darkened. It swirled. Veins of angry, molten red began to snake through the white. The gold circuitry on the cannon turned a deep, burning orange. The hum of the weapon changed from a high-pitched whine to a low, guttural roar, like a dragon gargling lava.

  The air around Lloyd began to distort from the heat. The floor tiles cracked under his feet just from the ambient temperature radiating off the gun.

  "Warning," the System whispered in his ear. "Weapon energy density exceeding safety limits. Chamber breach probable."

  "Safety limits are for people who don't have health insurance," Lloyd retorted.