Chapter : 1349

  He looked at Tisha. "Listen to the streets. The rumors. If people start getting sick, or if there are whispers about our product, tell me immediately. The enemy will use fear as a weapon."

  He looked at Mei Jing. "You are the general of this front. Do not just focus on profit. Focus on stability. If we lose our economic power, we lose the ability to fund the army. We lose the ability to buy weapons. We lose."

  Mei Jing nodded slowly. She understood. "We are the supply line."

  "You are the fortress," Lloyd corrected. "If AURA falls, House Ferrum weakens. If House Ferrum weakens, the North falls. It is all connected."

  The team looked at each other. They were no longer just business partners. They were soldiers in a silent war.

  "We will be vigilant," Mei Jing promised. "We will check every coin. We will check every barrel. No devil is going to ruin this company."

  "Good," Lloyd said. "Because I need you to make a lot of money. I am going to spend a fortune in the next few weeks."

  "On what?" Günther asked nervously.

  "Research," Lloyd said vaguely. "Very expensive, very explosive research."

  He gathered his papers. The meeting was over. He had given them the green light to expand, but he had also given them the burden of vigilance.

  "One more thing," Lloyd said at the door. "If anyone asks where I am going... tell them I am inspecting the eastern expansion. Tell them I am very busy counting soap bars."

  "Where are you really going?" Tisha asked.

  Lloyd smiled. "To a museum. I'm going on a field trip."

  He left the room. He felt better about the business. Mei Jing was capable. Rolf was tough. They could handle the economic war.

  Now, he had to handle the tech war. He had the money. He had the time (thanks to fleeing his wives). Now he just needed the Golem Heart.

  "Two fronts," Lloyd whispered to himself as he walked down the street. "Money and Magic. I have to win both."

  He checked his pockets. He had his travel papers. He had a bag of gold. He was ready.

  The war was heating up. The shadows were getting longer. But Lloyd Ferrum was not afraid. He was prepared. And he was very, very motivated to stay away from his house for a few weeks.

  Lloyd stood in the King's private study. He had just explained his "Scholar's Mission" to King Liam. He had framed it perfectly. He told the King he was going to Ramos to research ancient defensive magics that could help protect the kingdom. It wasn't a lie, technically. The Aegis suit was defensive magic. It just happened to be defensive magic that could punch a hole in a mountain. And he needs the permission to touch the Golem Heart from.

  "Permission granted," King Liam said, stamping a travel document. "Go to Ramos and examine that heart. Learn what you can. If there are secrets in the City of Scholars that can help us fight the devils, bring them back."

  "Thank you, Your Majesty," Lloyd said, taking the paper. "I will be discreet. No explosions. Probably."

  "Try your best," the King smiled.

  Lloyd left the palace and headed to the rendezvous point. He had one last person to talk to. Ken.

  Ken Park was waiting by the side gate. He looked stoic as always. He was checking the straps on a horse. He looked ready for war.

  "Ken," Lloyd said, walking up. "Good news. The King said yes."

  Ken nodded. "I am ready, my lord. I have packed supplies for two weeks. I have sharpened my swords. I have mapped the route to Ramos."

  Lloyd cleared his throat. "About that. You're not coming."

  Ken froze. He slowly turned to look at Lloyd. His face didn't change, but his eyes widened by about a millimeter. That was Ken's version of a scream.

  "My lord?" Ken asked. "You are going alone?"

  "Yes," Lloyd said. "It's a solo mission. Undercover. If I bring a seven-foot-tall wall of muscle with me, people will notice. I need to be just a simple scholar. A nerd. Nerds don't have bodyguards."

  "It is too dangerous," Ken stated flatly. "There are assassins. There are devils. You are a high-value target. I cannot allow you to go unprotected."

  "I can protect myself," Lloyd argued. "I have my spirits. I have my void powers. I have my charm."

  Ken ignored the charm part. "My duty is to guard you."

  Chapter : 1350

  "Your duty is to obey me," Lloyd countered. "And my order is: stay here."

  Ken looked unhappy. He looked like a dog who had been told he couldn't go for a walk.

  "Why?" Ken asked.

  "Because I need to move fast," Lloyd lied. "And because... I need you here. I need someone to watch the estate. To watch the business. To watch my back in the capital."

  It was a weak excuse. Ken knew it. Lloyd just didn't want to explain that he was going on a quest that might involve stealing a national treasure and he didn't want to implicate his bodyguard. Also, he really wanted some alone time.

  "I will worry," Ken said. It was the most emotional thing he had said all year.

  "I know," Lloyd said gently. "But I'll be fine. I'm a cockroach, Ken. I'm hard to kill."

  Ken sighed. He accepted the order. He was a professional.

  "But," Lloyd said, a mischievous glint appearing in his eye. "Since you have all this free time now... maybe you can use it productively."

  "Training?" Ken suggested. "Patrols?"

  "No," Lloyd grinned. "Dating."

  Ken blinked. "Dating? I do not understand."

  "Habiba," Lloyd said. "The Sand Heroine. Princess Amina's bodyguard. The girl who gave you the honey-cake. The girl you fought beside."

  Ken's stoic mask cracked. A faint, very faint, blush appeared on his cheeks. "We are... colleagues. Warriors."

  " colleagues who gaze at each other," Lloyd teased. "I saw you. In the carriage. You shared a look. It was a very intense look. It was a look that said, 'I respect your sword skills and also your face.'"

  "My lord, please," Ken said, looking down at his boots. "There is nothing romantic. We simply... understand each other. We are both guardians."

  "Uh-huh," Lloyd laughed. "Listen to me, Ken. I am a mess. My love life is a disaster zone. I have three women trying to marry me, and I am terrified of all of them. Don't be like me. Don't wait until it's complicated."

  He clapped Ken on the shoulder. "You have two weeks. Go find her. Buy her a sword. Or a cake. Whatever she likes. Talk to her. Not about security protocols. About... life. Birds. Clouds. Stuff."

  Ken looked terrified. More terrified than when he fought the King-Level assassin. "I do not know how to talk about... stuff."

  "You'll figure it out," Lloyd encouraged. "You're a smart guy. Just apply your tactical mind to romance. Assess the target. Identify interests. Execute date."

  Ken looked doubtful, but he nodded. "I will... consider it."

  "Good," Lloyd said. "Now, I have one actual task for you. Before you go woo your warrior princess."

  Ken straightened up. "Yes, my lord?"

  "I need a contact in Ramos," Lloyd said. "Someone who knows the city. Someone who knows the museum. Not a spy. Just a fixer. Someone who can get me into places without an appointment."

  Ken thought for a moment. "There is a man. An old associate. He is a retired thief. He lives in Ramos now. He runs a bookshop. His name is Silas."

  "A retired thief who runs a bookshop," Lloyd smiled. "Perfect. That sounds exactly like the kind of person I need."

  "I will send word to him," Ken said. "He owes me a favor. He will help you."

  "Excellent," Lloyd said. He tightened the straps on his bag. "Alright. I'm off. Don't follow me. Don't send a rescue party unless I'm gone for a month."

  "Be safe, my lord," Ken said, bowing.

  "I'll try," Lloyd said. "And Ken? Good luck with Habiba. If you get married, I'll plan the wedding. I'm getting really good at planning weddings."

  Ken turned a deeper shade of red.

  Lloyd mounted his horse. He took a deep breath of the morning air. He was alone. Finally. No wives. No princesses. No bodyguards. Just him and the road.

  He kicked the horse into a trot. He rode out of the city gate, merging with the traffic of merchants and travelers. He pulled his hood up. He was just a scholar now. A scholar on a quest for knowledge.

  And a giant robot brain.

  "Ramos," Lloyd whispered. "Don't disappoint me."

  As the capital faded behind him, Lloyd felt the tension leaving his body. He was moving forward. He had a plan. He had a goal. And for the first time in weeks, he felt like he was exactly where he was supposed to be: on an adventure.

  The road to Ramos stretched out before him, winding through the hills. It was a long ride. But Lloyd didn't mind. He had a lot of thinking to do. And a lot of bad singing to inflict on his poor horse.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  "I'm gonna build a robot," he hummed to himself. "A big, scary robot..."

  The horse whinnied in protest, but kept walking. They were on their way.

  Chapter : 1351

  The steam train rattled rhythmically against the iron tracks, creating a hypnotic, clanking lullaby that usually put travelers to sleep. But Lloyd Ferrum was wide awake. He sat in a private first-class compartment, staring out the window as the green countryside of the kingdom blurred into a smudge of color. He wasn't looking at the cows or the trees. He was looking at his own reflection in the glass, and for the first time in weeks, he didn't look like a man who was being hunted by three different women who wanted to marry him. He looked like a man who had successfully escaped a burning building with his eyebrows still intact.

  "Freedom," Lloyd whispered to the window. "Sweet, silent, non-political freedom."

  He took a sip of tea. It was terrible train tea, watery and bitter, but to him, it tasted like victory. He had left the capital. He had left the drama. He had left the terrifying prospect of explaining to the Sultan why he couldn't marry Princess Amina for now because his first wife, whom he was supposedly divorcing, had decided to become a terrifyingly possessive ice statue in his living room. And let’s not forget Faria, who was probably currently setting fire to something because his mother had promised him to her.

  "I should write a book," Lloyd thought. "'How to Ruin Your Life in Ten Days: A Guide by Lloyd Ferrum.' It would be a bestseller."

  But he wasn't here to write books. He was here for a rock. Well, a very specific, very expensive, very old rock.

  Lloyd reached into his bag and pulled out a thick folder of notes. The title on the first page read: Project Aegis: Core Failure Analysis. He flipped through the pages. They were filled with drawings of his battle suit and big, angry red X marks over the head section.

  The suit was a masterpiece of engineering. It was strong. It was fast. It was durable. But it was brainless. The Lilith Stones he had risked his life to get were good at basic tasks, like "move left arm" or "fire laser," but they couldn't think. They couldn't adapt. If he programmed the suit to walk forward and there was a hole in the ground, the suit would walk into the hole and then stand there at the bottom, waiting for the next instruction.

  "I need a brain," Lloyd muttered. "Not a rock. A brain."

  That was why he was going to Ramos. Ramos was the City of Scholars, a place where people cared more about old books than current wars. It was also home to the Ramos Old Military Museum. And inside that museum sat the Golem Heart.

  Lloyd turned the page in his folder to a sketch of the Heart. It looked like a complex sphere of stone and crystal, covered in carvings that made no sense to modern mages. It was 500 years old. It was created by a genius named Anubis.

  "Anubis," Lloyd said, tapping the paper. "The man who invented artificial intelligence five centuries before the steam engine. And then he died and burned all his notes because he was a paranoid genius. Thanks, Anubis. Really helpful."

  The Golem Heart was legendary. Stories said it powered a guardian that defended an entire city by itself. It didn't just follow orders; it made decisions. It protected civilians. It prioritized threats. It learned.

  To the rest of the world, the Heart was just a cool antique. It was a paperweight. A very expensive decoration that sat in a glass case. Mages had tried to turn it on for hundreds of years. They poured mana into it. They cast spells on it. Nothing happened. So, they decided it was broken. A relic of a lost age that would never work again.

  "They gave up too easily," Lloyd thought. "They think it's a magic item. It's not. It's a computer. A computer made of stone, but a computer nonetheless."

  Lloyd had tried to replicate it. He had built five different prototypes based on the few descriptions he could find in books. Every single one of them had failed. They either did nothing, or they hummed for three seconds and then exploded. He still had scorch marks on his workshop wall from Prototype Number 4.

  "I can't build it from a description," Lloyd realized. "I need to see the original. I need to look inside it."

  Chapter : 1352

  That was his secret weapon. His [All-Seeing Eye]. The power he had bought from the System that let him see through walls, skin, and stone. He could look at the Golem Heart and see the internal circuits. He could see the flow of energy. He could reverse-engineer the genius of Anubis without ever touching the glass case.

  "One look," Lloyd said to himself. "That's all I need. Just one good look at the internal structure, and I can build my own. I can fix the Aegis. And then..."

  He leaned back in his seat. "And then I can fight monsters without dying instantly. That would be nice."

  The train whistle blew, a loud, shrill sound that echoed through the compartment. Lloyd checked his pocket watch. They were making good time. They would arrive in Ramos by evening.

  He felt a thrill of excitement. This was a scholar's mission. No swords. No demons. No angry wives. Just him, a museum, and a piece of ancient technology waiting to be understood.

  "It's practically a vacation," Lloyd smiled. "What could possibly go wrong?"

  He closed his eyes, imagining the museum. He would walk in, buy a ticket like a normal person, stare at the artifact for an hour, memorize its schematics, and then leave. He would have the secret to the ultimate weapon, and nobody would even know he was there.

  It was a perfect plan. And Lloyd loved perfect plans. They were so rare in his life. Usually, his plans involved improvised explosions and a lot of running. But this time, he was determined to be boring. Boring was safe. Boring was good.

  "Just a boring trip to a boring museum," Lloyd affirmed. "I will be the most boring person in Ramos."

  He picked up a sandwich he had packed. It was ham and cheese. Very boring. Perfect. He took a bite and watched the world go by, blissfully unaware that the universe had a very different definition of "boring" than he did.

  The train chugged along, winding its way through the mountain passes that separated the central kingdom from the western territories. The scenery was getting more rugged. Tall peaks capped with snow loomed in the distance. Ramos was a mountain city, built on stone and mining. It was a place of hard rock and hard heads.

  Lloyd finished his sandwich and wiped his hands on a napkin. He pulled out another book from his bag. This one wasn't about engineering. It was a guidebook: The Traveler’s Guide to Ramos: History, Hotels, and Hygiene.

  "Let's see," Lloyd mumbled, flipping through the pages. "Best places to eat. 'The Stone Soup Tavern.' Sounds appetizing. 'The Rusty Gear Inn.' Sounds like I need a tetanus shot just to sleep there."

  He wanted to find a hotel that was comfortable but obscure. He didn't want to stay at the luxury hotel where all the nobles stayed. He wanted to be invisible.

  "Here we go," he pointed at an entry. "'The Scholar’s Rest.' Quiet. Clean. No loud music allowed. Strict curfew. It sounds like a library with beds. Perfect."

  He marked the page. Staying at The Scholar's Rest would help his cover. He was just Professor Ferrum, a humble academic interested in ancient gears. He wasn't Lord Ferrum, the man who accidentally started a war with a devil cult.

  "I wonder what the others are doing right now," Lloyd mused.

  He imagined the chaos back home. Mei Jing was probably taking over the world, one bar of soap at a time. Tisha was probably charming the entire population of the capital. Ken was probably staring at a wall, worrying about Lloyd's safety.

  "Sorry, Ken," Lloyd thought. "But if I brought you, everyone would stare. You are too big. You look like a bear wearing a suit. You are conspicuous."

  Lloyd stretched his legs. The compartment was small, but it was private. He had paid extra for privacy. He didn't want to make small talk with strangers. He didn't want to hear about someone's sick cat or their opinion on the weather.

  He looked back at his notes on the Golem Heart. The key to the artifact was the "Will." The legends said Anubis found a way to imprint a basic consciousness into the stone. Not a soul, exactly, but a reflection of intent.

  "If I can figure that out," Lloyd thought, "I can program the Aegis to protect me automatically. I can program it to dodge. It would be like having a second nervous system made of steel."