CHAPTER 821: A DREAM IN THE FURNACE

Elliot’s eyes lit up before Adam ended his sentence. His fingers twitched around the wooden hilt of the hammer at his belt, its weight failing to steady his trembling fist. His lips tightened in rare solemnity as the forge’s coal-thick air filled his lungs.

"I don’t know how well you mastered enchanting techniques, but I want to trust you, to believe that even my dream, my poor skills everyone mocks, are worth pursuing," he said, voice low like a plea. "Please, show me what your style above all can create." He shook his head, rolling his sleeves up. "I’ll help you however I can."

Adam’s eyes fell on the boy’s forearm. He saw defined muscles that didn’t fit a barely ten-year-old kid, born from relentless hammering. His hands were the same—callused and tanned by the forge fire. He was a dimwit—he wouldn’t deny Joshua’s assessment—but the kind of dimwit he liked. Determined. Stubborn. Fueled by passionate dreams and delight. A hardworking boy who had failed so much that he had forgotten the very concept of failure.

While other students began sketching their projects, he guided Elliot in front of the anvil, pointing at the battered hammer. More than a few hairline cracks ran along its surface, and the enchantment lines struggled to hold together. "I bet you know how to swing that old friend of yours."

He grabbed a rough ore, its iridescent hues dancing in the furnace’s flickering flame. "Start by smelting this ore. We’ll cast it into molds, then dig channels inside as it cools."

Elliot tried to imagine what Adam wanted, only to scratch his head in utter bewilderment. "Shouldn’t you start by sketching your project? That’s what Teacher Viktor taught us."

"And he is right." However, Adam placed the ore in a crucible. "But I know what I want, and it’ll whisper what I don’t." He turned his back to Elliot, the furnace heat washing over him as he faced the fire, a thumb directed toward the other students. "Don’t let them distract you. We don’t have a second to waste if we want to beat them all."

Though unsure about the whispers, Elliot picked up long, blackened pincers, pinched the crucible between their arched edges, and plunged it into the fire.

When he stepped on a pedal, the heat burst outward in waves more unbearable than the last. Steam rose in a cacophony of sizzles and popping bubbles inside the raging fire.

The flames danced in Elliot’s narrowed eyes.

This was the first hurdle—to remove the smelted metal without burning it. He had failed many times with other pieces of Thyrium, an apprentice-tiered metal. But that’s also why he knew the crisp sound it made when ready to be poured and shaped.

Yet before that familiar moment came, Adam’s voice resounded, soft but confident. "Remove it."

"It’s not ready—"

Before Elliot could protest, Adam snatched and pulled the pincers out. The metal hissed and flared, sun-gold, yet he held it steady. "Perfect."

Elliot raised his palms, eyes trembling when he saw Adam’s satisfied nod. "It’ll crack, and the properties won’t be consistent. It needs two more minutes!"

"Not if you shape it with your mana." Adam shrugged, moving to the workstation. Every step radiated calm certainty.

He gripped one mold filled with soft clay, his mana digging the shape of a miniaturised mechanical arm. Then, he poured the heavy liquid into the holes at the top. The first layer of clay darkened, and he let his mana meld into the metal as it took its place. He repeated the process in several molds for the other arm, the legs, the torso, and the head.

"This is how I do it," he explained, leaning against the station. "This metal is resilient but lacks the flexibility we need. That’s why I completed the smelting with my own mana—to imbue the flowing nature of waves into its innate properties."

"Is that even possible?" Elliot yelped. "Thyrium is of the earth element. Water will clash with its nature."

"See it like this. Does water drown earth, or does earth drink water to flourish? Many elements can, in fact, work in symbiosis. But I’m sure Teacher Viktor plans to teach you this in a few years." He glanced at Joshua and Viktor’s other personal disciples as the divided Thyrium cooled in their molds. "Or perhaps he keeps advanced knowledge for them? But that’s hardly relevant to us, right?"

With a wink, he brought Elliot’s attention back to the cooling metal. Sky-blue mana danced over his palm, taking the shape of needle-thin channels that ran through the mechanical arm. He explained that it was the veins that would supply mana to their construct.

"Wait, wait, wait!" Elliot waved his hands urgently, his eyes wide, his breath catching. "Veins? Are we building a golem?" His voice echoed loudly enough for the students on the nearby station to gasp.

Someone’s hammer stopped mid-air over the ingot he had been flattening. Another dropped a piece of scalding metal on his anvil, the loud clang and explosion of sparks making him groan.

"Sure, we are." Adam chuckled. "A cool toy you’d be proud of. Now focus." The mana swirled silently in his palm, shifting to the torso, in which a circular hollow flashed red.

Viktor had mentioned a golem as if the very idea was ludicrous.

Mischief sparkled in his eyes as the nearby students leaned forward, their own scalding pieces dropped haphazardly on their anvils to cool. Without bothering with them, he forced Elliot out of his muted stupor by explaining their next steps.

"This is where we’ll engrave its protocols on the power source, but that comes later. First, we prepare its cool attire, of course."

A mana thread surged between Adam’s thumb and index. As if slicing through a soft cake, he divided three ingots into slabs. He layered them into a bigger ingot, then pinched it with the dark pincers before handing it to Elliot.

The few students watching them muttered in confusion. Even the boy glared at the composite alloy, frowning at the mystery, but he eventually picked the pincers from Adam’s hands. A broad smile broadened across his face when he plunged the metal into the furnace, a question ringing through his mind.

Could Adam really craft a golem?