The group were led through the Rustrows and out into a large open yard behind the main factory hall.
It wasn’t quite an arena.
It was worse.
An old loading yard had been cleared into a wide circular fighting ground, bordered by rusted gantries, broken cranes, and stacked scrap walls. Runes had been painted across the cracked concrete in chalky white lines, spiralling outward from the centre like a giant spell circle. Old banners hung from steel beams overhead, snapping gently in the warm wind.
The moment the group stepped inside, a gryphon elder raised her talons.
A mana barrier slammed down around the arena.
It shimmered gold and blue, sealing them in with a low, humming thrum that made Celeste’s teeth ache.
Lumina jumped. Skye flinched beside her.
Arcade spun around. “Oh, charming. Love being trapped inside magical hazard glass. Very welcoming.”
Mezzo looked around the arena, then at the watching crowd gathering beyond the barrier. He adjusted his jacket and lifted his chin.
“Well,” he said, “I’ll admit, this isn’t my usual stage. Bit rusty. No proper lighting. Audience looks like they might sacrifice me if I miss a note.”
Ray tightened her grip on Heartbreaker. “Mezzo. Focus.”
“I am focused. I’m just professionally offended.”
Across the arena, the Golem was brought forward.
It didn’t walk so much as thunder.
Each step cracked against the concrete, sending dust jumping from the ground. It stood twelve feet tall, assembled from blackened scrap metal, reforged plating, and molten seams that glowed like veins beneath its steel hide. Its arms were thick enough to crush a van. Its shoulders were set with jagged metal ridges. Runes crawled up and down its limbs, pulsing with slow orange light.
But that wasn’t what caught Celeste’s eye.
There were crystals embedded into it.
Four coloured crystals gleamed from its limbs: one in each arm, one in each leg. A fifth crystal shone from the centre of its head, brighter than the others, set like a crown jewel between two flickering rune-eyes.
Plum, standing a careful distance behind Hughes, lifted her notebook.
“There are runes up and down its arms,” she said quickly. “And crystals. Four coloured ones on the limbs. Fifth on the head. Possibly structural. Possibly magical. Possibly extremely shootable.”
Pitch clicked Lady Luck open and checked the chambers. “Shootable’s my favourite kind of possibly.”
Brassmane stepped forward before the barrier, his robes moving in the wind, antlers casting long shadows across the arena floor.
“The young will wait,” he said, voice firm.
Lumina’s ears dipped. “But—”
Brassmane’s gaze softened slightly, though his tone did not. “You may watch. You may learn. But this test is not yours to fight.”
Skye looked disappointed too, fingers tightening around his bracer. Lumina glanced at Celeste, then sighed and nodded.
“Come on,” she murmured to Skye.
The two found a bench near the edge of the arena, just behind one of the safer rune lines. Lumina sat with her hands folded tightly in her lap, trying very hard not to look like she wanted to leap in anyway. Skye sat beside her, quiet and tense, his eyes fixed on the Golem.
Celeste stared at the crystals.
Then slowly, like someone had handed her the best birthday present in the world, her face lit up.
“Oh,” she whispered.
Arcade glanced at her. “What?”
Celeste grabbed his sleeve, practically bouncing on her toes. “Oh! Oh! I bet if we hit the crystal things, we kill it.”
Arcade’s expression changed.
His eyes gleamed.
A grin spread across his face, sharp and delighted and deeply concerning.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh, that is absolutely a boss fight.”
Celeste nodded eagerly. “It’s got weak points!”
“It has colour-coded weak points,” Arcade said, cracking his knuckles. “That’s practically an invitation.”
Ray looked between them. “It cannot be that easy.”
Celeste and Arcade both ignored her.
Arcade clicked his fingers, and C.H.I.P. hovered higher beside him. “No problem. We’ll have this thing defeated before lunch.”
C.H.I.P. beeped. “Statement: confidence detected. Probability of immediate humiliation rising.”
Arcade pointed at him. “Not now.”
Hughes stepped beside Pitch, eyes narrowing as he studied the Golem’s weight, gait, and plating. “Legs first. Doesn’t matter how strong it is if it can’t move.”
Pitch nodded, spinning Lady Luck once before locking it into place. “I’ll keep pressure on the joints. You slow it, Ray breaks it, catgirl gets fancy with the shiny bits.”
Ray lifted Heartbreaker onto her shoulder. “We take it steady. We don’t rush the crystals until we know what they do.”
Celeste was still staring at the Golem like she had just found a secret level.
Mezzo leaned toward Plum. “She looks worryingly happy.”
Plum scribbled. “Subject appears delighted by imminent magical violence.”
Mezzo nodded. “Accurate.”
Brassmane raised his staff.
The arena quieted.
When he spoke, his voice rolled across the yard in deep, resonant Welsh.
“Mae ymddiriedaeth yn cael ei hennill drwy wir galon, nid drwy eiriau melys. Os ydych yn sefyll gyda’n pobl, profwch hynny drwy nerth, doethineb, a dewrder. Pasio’r prawf hwn, a byddwch yn gyfeillion i Lwyth Drain Grwydryn.”
C.H.I.P. translated instantly.
“Trust is earned through a true heart, not sweet words. If you stand with our people, prove it through strength, wisdom, and courage. Pass this test, and you will be friends to Clan Wayfarer Briar.”
The crowd beyond the barrier murmured.
Ray’s face tightened, but she nodded once.
Brassmane lowered his staff.
“Dechreuwch.”
Begin.
The Golem charged.
For something so enormous, it moved horribly fast.
Its feet smashed into the ground, each impact sending tremors through the arena. Celeste gasped and threw herself sideways as a massive steel fist slammed down where she had been standing. The concrete exploded, chunks of stone flying past her ears.
“Right!” Mezzo shouted. “So it’s rude as well as massive!”
Celeste rolled, sprang up, and summoned her twin katanas in a burst of starlight. The blades hummed as she crossed them in front of her.
Plum drew her gun and fired three quick shots.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
The bullets hit the Golem’s shoulder and bounced away uselessly with bright little sparks.
Plum stared. “Ah.”
Pitch glanced at her. “Problem?”
“I appear to have brought journalism to a siege engine fight.”
The Golem swung one arm.
C.H.I.P. expanded in a flash of shifting metal.
His small body unfolded and rebuilt itself into combat mode, plating locking into place, limbs extending, eyes glowing brighter. He hit the ground hard and braced both arms against the Golem’s incoming strike.
The impact rang through the arena.
C.H.I.P.’s heels scraped backward, carving lines through the concrete.
“Statement,” C.H.I.P. said dryly, holding the Golem’s arm back with visible strain. “I am touching the forbidden murder statue. I would like applause.”
Arcade dashed behind him, yanking wires from his pack and snapping together a pulse emitter. “Hold it still!”
“Request denied. I am currently being folded into modern art.”
Hughes slammed the end of Everstill, his crook, against the ground.
“Back!”
A ripple of pale magic spread from him, washing over the Golem’s legs. For a moment, the creature’s movements dragged, slowing as though the air around it had thickened into syrup.
Ray lunged in.
Heartbreaker smashed into the Golem’s knee joint with a deep, ringing boom. The force sent a crack through one layer of plating, but the Golem didn’t fall.
Ray snarled, shifted her grip, and drove the hammer upward.
“Skyhook Uppercut!”
Heartbreaker slammed under the Golem’s leg joint with a brutal rising strike. The impact didn’t launch the massive creature, but it jolted the limb upward and burst into a spray of phoenix embers that scattered across the cracked concrete.
Pitch fired Lady Luck in quick bursts, glowing card-symbol shots slamming into the other leg.
Spades. Clubs. Diamonds.
Then he flicked the barrel sideways with a grin. “Shadow Flush.”
Five cards fired in a rapid spread, striking one after another across the Golem’s knee. The final card curved midair, homing in on the weakest crack and detonating in a sharp burst of shadow.
Each impact made the runes flicker, but still the Golem pushed forward.
“Legs!” Ray shouted. “Everyone on the legs!”
Arcade snapped his head up. “No, crystals! The crystals are obviously the control anchors!”
“They could explode!” Ray barked.
“That is usually what weak points do!”
“That doesn’t make it safe!”
“It’s a fight with a soulbound scrap giant. Safe left ten minutes ago!”
Mezzo swung his guitar-axe around, fingers flying across the strings.
A sharp, distorted riff burst from the instrument, rolling through the arena in waves of vibrating sound. The Golem’s head jerked slightly, rune-eyes flickering as the sonic pulse struck it.
Mezzo grinned. “There we are. Everybody likes a solo.”
He strummed again, harder.
The sound split, echoing around the arena from three directions at once. The Golem turned, confused, its head tracking phantom noise as Mezzo’s superseded riffs bounced across the barrier.
Then Mezzo dragged the axe low and struck a fierce, ringing chord.
“Blazing Chord Slash!”
He swung wide. A flaming arc burst from the blade, roaring forward in a wave of heat that slammed against the Golem’s plating and sent sparks scattering across the arena floor.
Ray glanced at him. “Good. Keep confusing it.”
Mezzo puffed up. “I prefer dazzling.”
“Confuse it dazzlingly, then!”
“With pleasure!”
Celeste, meanwhile, was no longer where Ray expected her to be.
She had already gone for the crystal.
While C.H.I.P. held one massive arm back, and Hughes’s time-slowing magic dragged at the Golem’s joints, Celeste sprinted straight toward it. She jumped onto a chunk of broken concrete, kicked off, and caught one jagged plate on the Golem’s side.
“Celeste!” Ray shouted.
“I’m alright!” Celeste called back, which was a terrible thing to say while climbing a giant murder statue.
She drove one katana into a seam between plates and used it like a handhold, hauling herself higher as the Golem bucked and twisted beneath her.
Arcade looked up and grinned like a gremlin. “Yes! Exactly! Gamer instinct!”
Ray swung Heartbreaker into the Golem’s shin again. “Stop encouraging her!”
“I am scientifically supporting the obvious solution!”
“She is climbing the enemy!”
“That’s because she has vision!”
The Golem shook violently.
Celeste yelped and nearly lost her grip, one foot slipping off a piece of metal. She clung to the embedded katana, tail lashing wildly.
Pitch fired at the Golem’s shoulder to draw its attention. “Hey! Big ugly! Down here!”
The Golem turned toward him.
Pitch immediately regretted that.
It stomped forward, dragging C.H.I.P. with it.
“Oh, sugar.”
Hughes raised Everstill again, sweat already beading at his brow. “Ray! Again!”
Ray planted her feet, drew Heartbreaker back, and swung with everything she had.
The hammer struck the damaged knee.
This time, the plating split wider.
The Golem staggered.
Celeste used the motion, launching herself higher. She scrambled up its arm toward the glowing crystal embedded near the shoulder.
The crystal pulsed red.
Heat washed across her face.
“Oh, that’s definitely important,” she said, breathless.
Arcade cupped his paws around his mouth. “Hit it!”
Ray shouted, “Don’t hit it until we know what it does!”
Celeste hesitated for half a second.
Then the Golem reached for her with its other hand.
Decision made.
Celeste pulled one blade free and twisted on the narrow ledge of metal beneath her feet.
“Sorry!” she squeaked.
Then she spun.
Her twin katanas flashed around her in a dazzling circle as she performed Comet Waltz, flourish-spinning in place while slashing again and again. A glowing ring of light burst around her, scattering silver sparkles like falling stars. The Golem’s reaching fingers struck the circle and recoiled, sparks skittering across its metal knuckles.
For one shining second, Celeste looked less like a frightened girl clinging to a monster—
—and more like a little comet refusing to fall.
She finished the spin with both blades raised high.
Then she drove them down into the crystal.
The arena flashed red.
A shockwave burst from the Golem’s arm, flinging Celeste backward.
For one awful second, she was weightless.
Then C.H.I.P. released the Golem and lunged, catching her in one huge metal hand before she hit the ground.
“Catch successful,” C.H.I.P. said. “Style points: moderate.”
Celeste blinked up at him, dazed. “Thank you.”
The Golem roared.
The sound was not a voice, not really, but metal grinding against magic, deep enough to make the barrier ripple. The red crystal in its arm cracked, light leaking from it in sparks.
The entire limb slowed.
Arcade threw both hands up. “Weak point confirmed!”
Ray stared at the damaged arm.
Then at Celeste.
Then at Arcade.
“I hate when you’re right.”
Arcade beamed. “Everyone does.”
Across the arena, Brassmane stood perfectly still, watching.
His expression gave nothing away.
But Kirrin, beside him, tilted her head, feathers bristling with interest.
The elder in the red shawl whispered something to another elder.
Plum, crouched behind a broken bit of scrap, scribbled furiously. “Crystal strike disables limb. Celeste apologises to enemies before stabbing them. Arcade insufferable but correct.”
The Golem dragged its damaged arm, then shifted its full weight toward the group.
Four crystals remained.
The one in its head pulsed brighter.
Ray rolled her shoulders and lifted Heartbreaker again.
“Fine,” she said. “Crystals and legs. But we do this properly.”
Pitch grinned, spinning Lady Luck. “There she is.”
Mezzo struck another riff, sparks dancing off his strings. “Right then! Crystal smashing, leg breaking, monster bullying. Finally, a song with structure.”
Celeste slid down from C.H.I.P.’s hand and landed on her feet, katanas glowing brighter than before.
Her fear was still there.
Of course it was.
But underneath it, something else sparked.
Excitement.
Purpose.
Maybe even joy.
She looked up at the towering Golem and tightened her grip.
“Okay,” she whispered. “Four more. Just be useful, just be useful.”
