"Lagan" became my new world. I spent the following years traveling with it across the vast continent of technology. We no longer traveled with caravans or hid in cargo ships. I would walk inside my metal frame, with 404 by my side, a force that no one dared to challenge.

  The dynamic between us had changed. Once, while crossing the "Rusty Canyons," a pack of "Metal Hyenas" attacked us. In the past, I would have hidden behind 404. But this time, I stepped forward. Lagan's steel fist collided with their bodies, crushing them with ease. I stood looking at the wreckage and felt, for the first time in my life, the feeling of real power. I turned to see 404 standing back, watching in silence. I had become his shield now.

  One night, I was sitting in a huge library in Metroplex, surrounded by thousands of books, and on the table in front of me were the many notebooks I had filled with ink. I had done it. I had been traveling and writing down everything I saw on the continent of technology, achieving my dream! Finally. I felt satisfied, but... something was missing. My second mission.

  I looked at 404, who was standing silently as usual. I had shown him the greatest wonders of technology, read him the most complex philosophical theories, and exposed him to all kinds of music and art. But he remained the same. A cold, analytical machine.

  In the silence of the library, I heard the echo of a voice in my memory. The sound of a clear, bright laugh. "A world where Mana was everything... There, I can become the greatest sorceress."

  Aline.

  She had dreamed of it. The "Continent of Arcadia." The place she wanted to go. The place that represented everything that was not technological, everything that was not logical.

  In that moment, I found a new purpose. It wasn't just a search for a solution; it was a journey to her dream. Maybe there, in her world, I would find the answer.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  "Arcadia" was not as isolated as I had thought, but just another destination on the world map, a destination that the people of technology avoided. The next day, we booked two seats on a massive steam-powered airship heading east.

  "Arcadia" was a world of fantasy. There were no towers of glass, but giant forests whose trees glowed with an ethereal light, rivers that shone like liquid silver, and sorcerers' towers carved from living crystal. The air itself was saturated with energy; I felt it tingle on my skin.

  We spent months searching for the person I had heard about in legends. An ancient sorcerer, said to be blind, but who sees things that eyes cannot see. We finally found him in a small hut on the peak of a secluded mountain.

  He was a very old man, his skin as wrinkled as dried leaves. His eyes were covered with a silk cloth, but when we spoke, I felt that he was looking directly into my soul. "You have come from afar," he said in a quiet voice.

  "Sage," I said respectfully. "I have come to ask for help. This companion of mine... I want to help him feel. But he seems empty on the inside." The sorcerer didn't turn to 404. He remained "looking" directly at me.

  "You seek to fill the emptiness of others," he said quietly. "But you do not understand the emptiness that resides within you." I froze.

  "I do not see in you a simple human soul. I see a spark of divine fire, bound to a mortal body. I see an ancient and terrifying pact." He moved closer to me, and I felt a shiver run through my body.

  "You are the son of Prometheus. Your father claimed your life force as the price for your existence. That is why you were born empty. And that is why you do not have a 'Soul Gate'." Every word was like a hammer, shattering everything I knew about myself. All my feelings of inadequacy, of weakness... had a cosmic reason.

  The sorcerer continued, "But in exchange for this emptiness, the pact grants the son one absolute power. At any moment you choose, you have the right to summon your father and ask him for one wish. Any wish at all. But be warned... for the moment your wish is granted, your father will take the long-awaited price. In that moment, the spark of your life will be extinguished forever. Your life is the price of your wish."

  Silence filled the hut, broken only by the sound of the wind outside. So, this was the truth. My life was a curse, but it also held within it a divine power. A weapon that could be used only once, and its price was everything.

  All my life, I had been searching for a reason to live. And now, in this magical forest, in Aline's dream, I had finally found a reason worth dying for.