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Translator: Vine
Chapter Title: Skin of Steel
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Before the Iron Empress.
Shaking off my fear, I raised my head.
I had hesitated many times on the way here, wondering if I should choose a different path, but now…
Now, I steeled my resolve.
The Iron Empress began to charge at me.
It was as if she intended to steal any warmth a human possessed.
I opened the bag I held in my hand.
And pulled out a bottle.
A crimson liquid sloshed within the bottle.
A potion containing a miracle crafted by an alchemist.
Its effect: partial immunity to flames.
I wished for complete immunity, but…
Unfortunately, such a thing didn't exist in the 'Flame Butterfly' arc.
'Unless it was the ultimate potion, an elixir.'
What wasn't there, wasn't there.
Without hesitation, I uncorked the potion bottle and swallowed.
The thick, repulsive liquid inside slid down my throat.
It was bitter.
But I forced myself to swallow it all.
Clink!
I threw the potion bottle to the ground, then lifted my bag.
Inside the bag.
Filling it were crimson crystals, imbued with intense heat.
Whoosh!
Blazing heat emanated from the crystals.
These crystals were all Fire Essences.
The corpses of spirits began to burn their last embers.
"Damn it, please endure. Me."
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Recalling what was about to happen, cold sweat beaded on my face.
However, my body was already moving.
I pulled hard on the heat-protection magic cloth that enveloped the Fire Essences.
Hiss!
At that moment, the Fire Essences inside the bag unleashed a torrent of heat so fierce it could incinerate the bag itself.
The heat, which had been barely suppressed by the magic cloth until now, surged forth.
"Ughhhhh!"
And it was I who had to endure that heat.
My skin and muscles couldn't withstand the heat and began to melt.
My eyes rolled back, and my breath caught in my throat.
It was hot.
So hot, as if my body were burning away.
In fact, my body *was* burning.
This was, if anything, fortunate.
If I hadn't consumed the flame immunity potion, my skin and muscles would surely have burned away, and my bones would have melted.
Thanks to the potion, it stopped at this.
[ !!! ]
The Iron Empress, eyes wide with frenzy, lunged at me.
It was a searing heat she had never experienced before.
It was natural for her, who craved heat, to lose herself.
The Iron Empress, who had charged right up to me, reached out her hand towards my body.
Seeing this, I stubbornly clung to my consciousness.
Before the Iron Empress could touch my body.
I threw my body forward, towards her.
Whoosh!
With a burst of scorching heat, my body collided with the Iron Empress.
Immediately, the chilling cold emanating from the Iron Empress enveloped my body.
It was cold.
This side was truly bone-chillingly cold.
But at this moment, this cold was incredibly welcome.
This was because the heat flowing from the Fire Essences and the cold from her cancelled each other out.
I could breathe a little easier.
My mind, hazy from the heat, cleared.
Crackling-
At that moment, the Iron Empress's body began to slowly melt.
She had not consumed any flame immunity potion.
Thus, she received the full heat of the Fire Essences throughout her body.
The Fire Essences emitted such intense heat that it could melt even a body of steel.
However, the Iron Empress paid no mind to it at all, pulling me even closer.
As if she had yearned for this warmth for so long.
[ Aaaaaaah! ]
She cried out, embracing me fiercely.
She was undoubtedly wailing.
But for some reason, I sensed no sorrow in it.
Instead, she rejoiced at having regained the warmth.
Tears of steel flowed down her cheeks.
Seeing this, I hardened my resolve even further.
Yes, embrace me.
Since I will melt away the lingering regret you had to bear, unable to become a god, even if it's in Lucas's stead.
So, embrace me like that.
From now on, it's a battle of time and mental fortitude.
Will my mental strength snap and collapse first?
Or will the Iron Empress completely melt away first?
It had become a fight of one against the other.
Of course, even if my mental strength were to snap.
The Iron Empress would not leave me and vanish.
She would simply continue to hold me, melting away until she met her eternal rest.
But that couldn't happen.
If that happened, there would be no reason for me to have gone through all this trouble.
Grind!
I clenched my teeth until they felt like they would shatter.
The heat and cold penetrated my skin, causing excruciating pain.
This was the first time I had ever felt such pain in my life.
However, the more the pain persisted, the clearer my mind became.
I gripped the fraying thread of my mental strength tightly, holding on so it wouldn't break.
If I just kept enduring, kept holding on.
Eventually, an end would come.
Until then, I would simply continue to endure.
* * *
Time flowed ceaselessly.
I couldn't gauge how much time had passed.
Only one thing was certain: an eon wouldn't have felt longer than this.
My vision was blurry.
I could barely feel any strength in my body.
It was a miracle I could even breathe.
The heat from the Fire Essences that I had embraced and held was now completely diminished, finally losing its light.
My breathing was shallow.
Late-coming beads of sweat formed one by one on my forehead.
My mouth was parched.
I slowly lifted my head.
With blurry eyes, I surveyed my surroundings.
The Iron Empress was nowhere to be seen.
She, who had wandered aimlessly until the very end, searching for warmth.
She, who had failed to become a god and instead became a mystery, was no longer in this world.
A strange sense of pity enveloped me, then passed.
The burnt-out crystals fell from my bag and rolled across the floor.
Clatter-
Then, the steel floor, where the crystals had landed, began to crack.
The cracks soon spread throughout the entire forest.
CRACK!
Finally, all the steel shattered, and the forest returned to its original form.
The shattered pieces of steel rose into the sky, fragment by fragment.
Bearing the Iron Empress's wish to become a god until the very end.
The steel vanished into the heavens.
Thud-
I fell to my knees.
I had no strength left to move.
My skin, which had been scorched by the heat, was now completely peeled away, leaving no form.
Instead, something else filled the exposed skin.
Steel.
It was steel.
Remnants of the Iron Empress, as she melted, were haphazardly embedded in my skin.
It looked as if I had been plated.
I had waited for this all along.
I painstakingly straightened my posture and sat up.
I immediately began melting the steel with the faint residual heat remaining in my body.
The steel then evenly melted and began to seep into my skin.
This was no ordinary steel.
It was the mystery that constituted the Iron Empress.
The protagonist, Lucas, after melting the Iron Empress,
would have her steel melt into his body, gaining a new mystery.
'Body of Steel.'
True to its name, it was a body as sturdy as steel.
The Body of Steel would synergize with Lucas's Flames of Valor, greatly enhancing his growth.
However, my situation was fundamentally different from Lucas's.
Lucas could melt all the steel integrated into his body with his Flames of Valor.
But I could only utilize the residual heat from the Fire Essences, at best.
I couldn't fully melt the steel.
'Therefore, I would...'
I would do my utmost.
My skin began to be completely overlaid with the melted steel.
Even if I couldn't acquire the same Body of Steel as Lucas.
It was for the sake of possessing something different.
'As of today, I possess the Skin of Steel.'
I painstakingly overlaid the steel onto my melted skin.
Anyway, the pain had faded.
There was nothing left to hesitate about.
Steel ceaselessly covered my skin.
The moment my body was completely dyed with the sheen of steel.
Flicker-
All residual heat in my body vanished.
The heat was gone, and I could breathe freely.
Regaining my senses, I slowly raised my hand.
Then, I saw my hand, overlaid with steel.
My hand moved without issue.
Finally, I had obtained the Skin of Steel.
"Hoo, hoo."
I repeatedly exhaled the breaths I had held until now.
I looked down at my limp body.
The Veil Bandage, a special equipment, wouldn't disappear from something like Fire Essences.
As even the Flames of Valor couldn't melt the Veil Bandage.
My appearance was still Hanon Aire.
However, the Veil Bandage granted one more change.
The Veil Bandage began to change the steel skin back to my original skin color.
Before I knew it, I had completely returned to Hanon's appearance.
Regardless of what lay beneath.
Outwardly, I was indistinguishable from Hanon.
"Haa, haa."
My mental state was almost at its limit.
Regardless of being overlaid with steel, my body was still covered in wounds.
Normally, the future Spirit Monarch would appear, offer thanks, and heal my wounds.
But there was nothing before me.
Where had all the spirits gone?
The spirits were nowhere in sight.
"Heh, heh-heh, so, I'm not Lucas, huh."
A hollow laugh escaped my lips.
That was, after all, a fortunate encounter reserved for Lucas.
Someone like me, with no spirit affinity whatsoever, probably didn't matter.
It's fine.
I didn't particularly intend to become a spirit user anyway.
I crawled across the ground and picked up the bottle I had left near the tree earlier.
It was a High Healing Potion, prepared at great expense.
I poured the crimson potion into my mouth.
Once in my stomach, the potion spread evenly throughout my entire body.
I lay my body on the ground, as if collapsing.
I could feel my wounds healing.
I had used the partial flame immunity potion, and the Iron Empress had partially offset the heat.
Thanks to that, only my skin and superficial muscles were burnt.
This much should somehow recover with a High Potion.
However, mental strength was a different matter.
Even so, perhaps because of what I had just endured.
Due to mental exhaustion, I could no longer hold on.
I had acquired an important card that would sustain me from now on.
'All that remains now is...'
To train for the mock battle.
Fortunately, training was a field I was somewhat confident in.
I had gone this far.
If I didn't win, all this effort would be for naught.
'...I will, without fail, win the mock battle.'
With the last breath that escaped my lips, I slowly closed my eyes.
A breeze from the Great Forest of Spirits brushed across my face.
I felt like I could get a good night's sleep.
Please, let my efforts not be in vain.
As I lost consciousness, I held onto that wish.