Any living thing under attack feels pain, fear, and slips up. A robot doesn’t.

Is that really an advantage? Not necessarily.

Pain and the reflex to shrink away are heirlooms written in genes, a shield grown in bone and blood. They work, most of the time. Otherwise congenital insensitivity wouldn’t be a terrifying curse.

Without pain feedback, a robot dodges only when a pilot or an AI tells it to. It means—

“Wrap it up.”

Dawn of Eden slid deep into the stone giant’s last limb—left shoulder, right at the joint. A 130-centimeter gunblade looked like a toothpick against that mountain of rock, yet Yekase pinned its axis true, so the arm could only swing forward and back.

Inside, every part was carved from stone as well. A heart of granite ticking like a cold drum.

No wear-and-tear worries? That’s magic-tech from centuries ago. Uncanny. If Harrison snapped photos for an expedition magazine, Yekase would name it: the Ancient Mechanical Giant.

The stone was a pale chalk-white, like bone soaked in moonlight. It naturally repelled Flash Energy and Sorcery, acting more like living tissue. It made Yekase’s dismantling a touch messy. Brutal materials married to mediocre design—by modern eyes—

Back in high school, Yekase competed in a timed club league building battle bots from LEGO. She already disliked most designs on the field. This kaiju-sized LEGO could arm-wrestle them, sure.

But judging the ancients by today is unfair. For their era, it was top-tier craft. Yekase didn’t know the exact level of Ancient Alchemy five or six centuries ago. Huaxia was still roaming with wandering swordsmen.

Picture it: a crowd calling Mind Energy “zhenqi,” splintered into sects feuding under dusty skies. They see a fifty-meter robot loom like a cliff. What faces would they make?

The giant’s left arm crashed down with a thunderclap of stone.

That was it. No more movement in its body. Silence settled like ash.

“They actually put a guard this big…” Harrison stared, hunger bright in his eyes. He couldn’t help himself. His hands drifted toward the scatter of ancient parts like a thief to silver.

Ivaris patted her hands together, a crisp clap. “Still such beautiful technique. Precision like surgery.”

“Can’t forget the tradecraft.”

Sitting on the giant’s rice-cooker head, Yekase weighed how to bolt its own parts into a pair of antennas. She rubbed the exposed gears at its neck, feeling their cold teeth.

“I think I get Arcadia now.”

“All the buildings and the mechanical guards here are built from this white, anti-sorcery stone. Or they crafted them, then etched some forgotten anti-sorcery rite onto them. That’s Arcadia’s big bet.”

“On a continent ruled by magic, they bricked their city with anti-sorcery mechs. A wall that doesn’t fall.”

Ivaris cocked her head, a diligent student with a wrinkle of doubt. “Then why did they still fall?”

“Because the Church’s mech-knight armies didn’t rely on magic. They used physical force, amplified by Runic Words.”

That still didn’t explain why the city’s defense systems hummed on while the residents were ghosts in the wind.

Yekase shelved that puzzle for later. First, she’d brief Ivaris on the Church’s troops.

“What’s terrifying about devout believers is the nature of their power—Runic Words. The stronger the faith, the tighter the sync with those Runes, the stronger the force. More force breeds deeper belief. Deeper belief tightens the sync. It’s a climb where your left foot steps on your right to reach the sky. It repeats until the Rune’s ceiling. That’s how they mass-produce high-order knights. I call this loop the faith base.”

“Then… Professor Ye, I have a question.”

“Ask away, Ivaris.”

“If that’s true, why don’t other Europeans build their own religions? The object of faith isn’t essential. Swap God for, say, a flying spaghetti monster, and you still get the same infinite loop, right?”

“People do try. The Church burns them. Or they stay tiny, hiding in independent city-states.”

“Okay, that tracks.”

Still, Ivaris had nudged something. Yekase knew the Iron Cross Knights drew power from faith, but she’d ignored it out of disdain for religion. If there’s a bonus to claim for free, why not use it?

Maybe she’d build one when they got back.

Call it the Slackfish Cult—Touch the Fish. Borrow Finn and the Salmon of Knowledge. The creed: seek wisdom and understanding. The supreme deity is the Holy Salmon. Through science, you swim closer to the divine. Every believer takes “touching the fish” as a life’s pursuit. It even sounded legit.

She could leverage her alleged antichrist branding—alleged?—to spread the word.

She didn’t need the buff herself. But it would arm common folk like giving them lanterns in a storm—quick, efficient, and good for education.

Europe’s Sinister Organizations can’t beat the Church. Research into Infinite Power is monopolized by nobles and the Church’s high ranks. So of course the layfolk include those hungry for theory but trapped under Church control. Plug them into the Slackfish Cult’s faith base. At least they’ll gain the basics to resist. Then they can sail toward Ivalice or Mysidia.

Like splitting liberal arts from sciences.

From those teachable believers, Yekase could screen for kind souls attuned to Flash Energy, train them alongside her course students, and slowly draw a team together.

Long view. After five years, once she returns to Huaxia…

…one bite at a time.

With the giant’s head processed, the three left the cleared plaza and walked into Arcadia’s empty streets.

Door plaques on the stone homes were etched in Old English. The translator caught them true, text shimmering over Yekase’s retina like frost on glass.

“…Williams Family,” Yekase whispered.

Harrison suddenly gripped the yard’s stone fence. Wonder flooded his gaze, and he kept shaking his head, hurried and lost.

Ivaris looked at him. “What’s wrong?”

“I… this place… I don’t know why, but it feels familiar.”

Harrison tugged off his round hat, wringing it in his hands. Sweat slid from his temples. His gray pupils trembled, chasing a phantom that wasn’t there anymore.

“You feel familiar with a ruin from centuries ago?” Ivaris arched a brow. Doubt was written clear. Harrison knew it made no sense. He lowered his head and shook it.

“—Your surname?”

Yekase called from across the street.

“Jones. My full name is Harrison Jones!”

“What’s your family story?”

“I lost my parents very young. I drifted in Mysidia until I joined the Adventurers’ Association.”

Yekase nodded and pointed to the next plaque.

“—Funny thing. There’s a Jones family right here.”

“—?!”

Yekase had zero reverence for preserving ruins. She kicked the yard gate open. Her hand swept toward the inside, inviting as a breeze.

“Want to go in?”

Doubt melted off Harrison. Curiosity and excitement charged back like a tide. He hurried in to search the ordinary little yard. Yekase stayed outside with Ivaris so he could breathe.

“You think… he might be a survivor from here?” Ivaris asked.

“Mm.”

Yekase let out a short nasal sound, a hum like a reed note.

“A span of centuries. Is that really possible?”

The black-haired, red-eyed mechanic didn’t answer directly. She drew out the stone giant’s core from her spatial clasp.

The core’s shell was polished into a sphere, its engine snuffed out, cold as a winter moon. Through the I/O ports and seams, you could glimpse impossible intricacy—precision no one expects from rough stone.

“I’ve seen one of these. Once.”

“Oh?”

“I don’t know its formal name. Back then, its owner called it the Silver Star Engine.”

Complex emotions flickered in Yekase’s eyes, like distant lightning behind clouds.

Ivaris didn’t grasp Infinite Power machinery. But she’d watched Yekase live through that disaster. She understood the weight of blood and tears in that term.

Those who chase knowledge, justice, and freedom must pay in sweat, struggle, and sacrifice. And then carry it all, and walk on.

“The last time I saw one, I’d only fused Flash Energy. I hadn’t crossed the ascension threshold. Holding it now, I finally get how it works. It stacks the purest Runes and link keys to bend spacetime curvature inside, crafting extreme parameters that trigger quantum effects at a macroscopic scale. The anti-gravity magic that lifts cities? Just one of its tricks.”

“Quantum effects… You’re not just freestyling jargon, are you?”

“Enormous mass-energy warps space. Energy that can’t escape pools in the warped pocket, sustaining and amplifying the warp. This engine is a man-made micro black hole. Arcadians mastered it. Opening a controllable wormhole to smuggle children a few centuries forward wouldn’t be hard.”

“And then they vanished?”

“And then they vanished.”

Where did they go?

Heaven knows.

Yekase tucked the black hole engine back into the spatial clasp and stretched, a cat waking at noon. “When he comes out, we’ll check the biggest palace. Their guards should be few. Otherwise I can’t imagine why Europe didn’t unite under them.”