The night fire burned low when Adonis called Barek and the two Ironback riders into the tunnels beneath the village. The rest of the Warband whispered above, wondering what “gift” their lord had promised.

  The chamber glowed faintly with glyph-light, the walls etched with fresh patterns Adonis had carved by hand. Vantage’s voice hummed steady in his mind, cold and clinical.

  > Method prepared. Forced Psionic Particle ignition will stabilize at threshold. Probability of survival: high. Probability of secondary mutation: negligible. Cost: permanent limitation of future growth. They will be locked into singular function.

  Adonis studied the three men before him. Barek stood unflinching, his scarred chest bare, eyes steady. The other two riders — men hardened by months of training and their bond with the Ironbacks — knelt with him, their faces set.

  Adonis spoke, his voice low but carrying weight.

  “You’ve stood at the front. You’ve faced the beasts, bled into the sand, and returned with strength. Now I’ll give you more. Not a riddle. Not a test. Power carved directly into your flesh.”

  The men didn’t stir. Only Barek’s jaw tightened. “What kind of power?”

  Adonis extended his hand. Sand rose, shaping itself into the form of a man whose skin glinted like steel. When the construct clenched its fist, the air cracked with force.

  “Skin of metal,” Adonis said. “Blades will break against you. Fire will wash off. With the Pilot’s Breath, your bodies will endure like stone forged in the desert’s heart. You will stand as Magi stand.”

  The riders’ eyes widened. Barek only grunted once. “And the cost?”

  Adonis’s golden-flecked gaze met his. “This is your only path. No riddles. No evolution. No other gifts. Your particles will harden into iron, and iron does not change. You will never grow beyond it.”

  Silence stretched. The three men exchanged glances. Then Barek stepped forward, scarred and resolute. “Iron is enough.”

  The other two followed.

  Adonis raised his hand. Glyphs flared in the chamber, burning bright as psionic particles condensed. The men convulsed, bodies shuddering as their skin darkened, hardened, shimmered with metallic sheen. Cries tore from their throats, echoing off the stone.

  Adonis’s nose bled faintly as he held the flow steady. Vantage counted down in his mind.

  > Stabilization… 80%... 92%... complete.

  The glow faded. Barek staggered to his feet first, his chest gleaming like hammered bronze beneath the torchlight. His hand closed around a shard of stone — it crumbled like sand in his grip.

  The two riders rose with him, their bodies gleaming faintly in the light, every movement radiating newfound strength.

  Barek looked at Adonis, his voice raw but steady. “Then we are your shields. No beast. No Magi. Nothing touches this village while you walk into the dark.”

  Adonis wiped the blood from his lip, smirking faintly. “Good. Because the twins and I won’t be here to hold your hand.”

  Selene and Kalen stepped into the chamber’s edge, their eyes sharp, their forms ready. Nyra lingered behind, her hood low, fire dim. She didn’t speak — she didn’t need to. They all knew her face burned too bright to walk into enemy lands unnoticed.

  Adonis’s voice dropped, calm but commanding. “Three will guard the desert with iron. Three will walk into rot with judgment. That’s how we move forward.”

  The men bowed their heads. The desert had its shields.

  And its blades.

  ***

  The dawn light spilled across the camp, catching on steel that hadn’t been there the night before.

  The first to see them were the villagers drawing water from the wells. One woman dropped her clay jar with a shatter when Barek strode into view, his chest and arms gleaming like hammered bronze in the sun. The two Ironback riders followed, their bodies shimmering with the same metallic sheen. They moved like men, but their presence radiated something more — unbreakable, immovable, forged by will and desert.

  And behind them, the Ironbacks themselves bellowed, horns glinting in the light, hides scarred but steady. Beasts that could trample stone. Beasts that now carried riders whose skin could not break.

  “Steelmen,” someone whispered. “Unbreakable men on unbreakable mounts.”

  The whisper spread like fire through dry grass. Soon the whole village stood gathered, staring, murmuring, half in awe and half in fear.

  Adonis emerged from the shadows of the wall, arms folded, gaze calm. “These are your commanders. Barek and his riders. They are iron now — flesh hardened into steel, will bound to the desert. With them, the Ironbacks are no longer beasts. They are weapons. Walls that walk.”

  Barek’s metallic fist tightened, the sound like stone grinding. “No beast, no flame, no Magi touches this village while we stand.”

  The villagers cheered — not timidly, but with a rising roar that echoed across the dunes.

  Nyra stepped forward, her crimson fire flickering faintly around her hands. Her hood was down now; she wasn’t hiding. “Then they’ll need to learn to stand against real power. Against Mages. I’ll train them myself. By the time you return,” her gaze flicked toward Adonis, “they’ll be able to fight a Three-Circle Mage and hold their ground.”

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Barek inclined his head, respectful even as firelight licked across his new skin. “Then teach us, Phoenix. We’ll learn.”

  Adonis smirked faintly. “And when I come back, you’ll train me too. In Phoenix fire.”

  Nyra froze, blinking once. The blush rose before she could stop it, faint but unmistakable against her tan skin. “You don’t… you don’t even know what you’re asking.”

  Adonis’s smirk widened. “Maybe I don’t. Or maybe I know exactly.”

  Her flames sputtered once before she turned sharply, hiding the heat in her cheeks.

  Selene’s soft laugh broke the tension, her frost curling idly at her fingertips. “Careful, Nyra. He has a way of getting what he wants.”

  The villagers laughed nervously with her, but their eyes stayed on Barek and the riders, gleaming like statues come alive.

  Steelbound men on Ironbacks.

  The desert had never seen the like.

  ***

  The morning broke sharp and clear, the desert air already heavy with heat. At the edge of the fortress walls, the crowd gathered in silence, their eyes fixed on the impossible vessel resting on the dunes.

  It wasn’t wood or iron, but sculpted sand and stone, bound by glyphs that pulsed faintly with psionic light. Its prow ended in the carved likeness of a falcon’s head, wings etched along its flanks. It was no cart, no chariot. It was a boat, resting on dry dunes as if waiting for an ocean that did not exist.

  Adonis stood at the bow, calm and unmoving. The twins took their place at his side — Kalen with his bow across his back, Selene’s hands pale with frost sheathed in cloth.

  A hush swept the crowd when Adonis pressed his palm to the glyphs at his feet. The desert stirred. The dunes shifted, grinding like the slow roll of a tide. And then, with a groan of earth, the boat lifted.

  Sand flowed beneath it, carrying the vessel forward as if the desert itself had become water. Gasps rippled through the villagers; some fell to their knees.

  At the front of the crowd, Barek stood with the two other Ironback riders. Their skin glimmered faintly with a metallic sheen, a reminder of the gift Adonis had forced into their flesh. They looked like men carved from bronze and steel, weapons raised high. When they shifted, the shimmer faded, returning them to their human forms, though the strength remained within their bodies.

  Barek’s voice carried, steady and firm. “Steelmen stand with you, Lord of the Dunes. Go, and return. We’ll hold this land.”

  The villagers echoed him in murmurs, some in awe, others in reverence. The sight of Ironbacks snorting behind their riders, their hides armored and unyielding, left no doubt. Their village was no longer prey.

  Adonis looked back once, his face unreadable. “This vessel was made for one purpose — to carry us across the desert’s heart. When we return, we won’t just endure. We’ll rule.”

  The boat surged forward, cutting across the dunes like a ship on a living sea.

  On the walls, Nyra lowered her hood, fire flickering faintly around her. “Steelmen with Ironbacks,” she murmured. “An army no mage would take lightly.”

  Then, louder, so the riders heard: “I’ll forge them sharper. I’ll train them until even a third-circle mage bleeds against their blades.”

  The Steelmen raised their fists in answer.

  Selene turned, catching Adonis’s eye, her voice low so only he could hear. “And what about you? What will you take from her fire when you return?”

  Adonis smirked faintly, his gaze on the horizon. “Everything she’s willing to give.”

  Nyra, hearing the words, turned her face away — though a faint flush warmed her cheeks, the first sign of doubt flickering across her composure.

  The boat carried them farther, the fortress shrinking behind. The desert swallowed them in silence.

  And somewhere ahead, hidden in the wastes, corruption waited.

  ***

  The desert stretched endless, the sand-boat gliding smooth as a hawk across waves. Adonis had his eyes half-closed, sensing the rhythm of the dunes through the glyphs beneath his palm.

  That was when the threads shifted.

  The sand below trembled with unnatural hunger, the ground bulging in places like a sickness crawling beneath the surface. Adonis’s gaze sharpened. “Spiders,” he said flatly. “Sand Spiders.”

  The dunes cracked open.

  They came in swarms — each the size of a horse, their bodies plated in chitin streaked with oily black veins. Mandibles clicked as they surged toward the boat, dozens of them, legs stabbing into the sand like spears.

  Selene’s breath misted as she tensed, frost coiling around her palms. Kalen was already grinning, bow raised, void energy humming along his arrow.

  Adonis didn’t move. He simply stepped aside, letting the twins take the bow. “They’re yours. Consider it training.”

  Kalen loosed first. His arrow vanished into blackness, reappearing mid-flight with a snap, cutting through two spiders in one shot. The void swallowed their shrieks before the corpses hit the sand. He blinked off the boat in the same motion, his form flickering in and out of existence as he appeared on a spider’s back, blade plunging into its skull, then vanished again.

  Selene swept her frost wide, the air cracking cold as spears of ice formed midair and launched with precision. Each strike froze legs brittle, shattering with sharp reports as spiders toppled into the dunes. Her movements had sharpened; her control no longer wavering but clean, deliberate.

  Adonis watched, arms folded, voice cutting through the clash. “Kalen, stop showing off and keep your exits clean. Don’t blink blind — it will get you gutted. Selene, anchor your frost deeper. Surface ice breaks too easily in the desert heat.”

  Both adjusted instinctively, their rhythm tightening. Together, they fought like storm and shadow, leaving the sand littered with twitching husks.

  But Adonis’s focus had shifted. The corruption in the spiders wasn’t simple infection — it was thick, deliberate, their veins pulsing with the same inverted glyph-patterns he’d seen in the ruin. He felt it in the particles, heavy and rancid.

  A Corrupted King was near.

  His jaw clenched. Every instinct screamed at him to hunt it, to purge it. But Lei’s crystal burned cold in his cloak. Three months. The Black Meridian.

  Adonis turned from the dunes, his voice sharp. “Finish them. We move. The true rot is close — closer than I like. But we don’t have time to bleed for it now.”

  The twins struck down the last of the spiders, standing amid broken bodies, breath sharp in their chests. They looked at Adonis. He only smirked faintly. “Not bad. But you’ll need to be faster next time.”

  The boat surged forward again, leaving the corruption writhing in the sands behind them.

  ***

  The training grounds were alive with heat. Barek and the Steelmen stood in formation, sweat streaking their metallic skin, while Nyra paced before them, hood down, her expression sharp.

  She lifted her hand, letting a faint spark of flame dance in her palm. “This,” she said, voice clear, “is what a Magi will give you. A fireball. A trick. Enough to scorch a beast’s hide, enough to kill a man who isn’t ready. But a Magi has to think before they strike. They borrow power. They channel it. They’re fragile.”

  She snapped her fingers, the flame vanishing.

  Her stance shifted. Fire erupted across her arms, cloaking her shoulders, her eyes glowing faintly red. She moved — faster than the eye could follow. In one breath she was in front of the target dummy, in the next its head fell from its shoulders, the cut blackened by flame.

  Nyra turned back to them, her voice cold. “A Mage doesn’t waste time on tricks. We don’t need to. We are faster, stronger, sharper. What’s the point of casting a fireball when I can cut your throat before you even raise your hand?”

  The Steelmen exchanged uneasy glances, but none flinched. Barek’s jaw tightened as he stepped forward. “Then teach us to face that speed. To endure it.”

  Nyra studied him for a long moment, then let her flames recede. “Good. Because you’ll need to. Dragons are stronger than Phoenix in body — heavier claws, harder scales. But Phoenix are faster, sharper, and our flames burn hotter. That’s how we even the scales. That’s how you’ll train.”

  She swept her gaze over the Steelmen, their bodies gleaming faintly bronze in the sun. “You are iron now. If you want to survive the storm that’s coming, you must learn to move like fire. No hesitation. No wasted breath.”

  The Steelmen bowed their heads. The lesson was clear: against Magi, strength was enough. Against Mages, survival would demand speed and precision.

  Nyra exhaled softly, a flicker of thought crossing her face. If they can’t keep up with me, they’ll never survive the dragons.

  ***

  The training ground cleared, leaving only Nyra and Barek at its center. The Steelmen and villagers ringed the edges, their murmurs hushed, waiting.

  Nyra’s flames flickered low across her arms, not burning hot, but alive — a predator’s warning. Barek stood bare-chested, his skin gleaming faintly bronze in the sunlight, his fists clenched at his sides.

  “Don’t hold back,” Nyra said, eyes sharp. “If you do, you’ll die the moment a Mage moves for your throat.”

  Barek only grunted and shifted his stance. His breath came slow and steady — three in, four out. The rhythm Adonis had drilled into him. The Pilot’s Breath.

  Nyra blurred forward, faster than the eye could follow. But Barek was already moving, his metallic arm snapping up to block her strike. Sparks flared as flame met steel.

  Gasps rippled from the watchers.

  Nyra spun low, her leg sweeping, but Barek leapt back with surprising agility, his heel crushing stone when he landed. She pressed, her strikes sharp and precise, but each time Barek’s body reacted just before the blow landed, his muscles surging with psionic strength, his breath keeping him centered.

  At last, she broke off, flames guttering low, her chest rising with controlled breath. She smirked faintly. “Faster. Stronger. Much faster than a human should be.”

  Barek straightened, unbowed. His metallic chest glinted with sweat. “That’s what the boy gave us. Pilot’s Breath. It turns air into iron.”

  Nyra studied him for a long moment, then nodded once. “Then teach it to me.”

  The crowd stirred, shocked. Barek raised a brow. “You? A Mage?”

  Her smirk sharpened. “Even a Mage breathes. And in return, I’ll teach you something greater — martial arts.”

  The murmurs grew louder. Martial arts were no village trick, no soldier’s drill. They were the fighting forms of nobility, passed only through bloodlines. Every true Mage knew them. Few Magi ever did.

  Barek’s jaw tightened. He glanced once at the men watching, then gave a slow, solemn nod. “Done.”

  Nyra’s flames flickered once more, this time in satisfaction. “Then let’s forge warriors who can kill Magi and live against Mages.”

  The crowd roared, the sound echoing off the fortress walls. Steel and flame had struck their pact.