Alka trailed after the angry dwarf, happy just at the fact that she could actually trail after someone again. Sure, flying and drifting around had its perks, like being able to mock Vin for his fear of heights, but not being able to actually touch or interact with anything was a huge pain.

  She watched the dwarf scratch the side of his face along the burned, melted portion of his skin, and Alka would have frowned if she’d been capable of moving her new mouth.

  There were plenty of strange things she was still growing used to regarding her new body, but one of the weirdest ones she’d encountered so far that she was still adjusting to was her enhanced vision. She hadn’t brought it up to her friends because it was kinda hard to explain, but essentially, she didn’t have peripheral vision anymore. Her field of view was still the same as a regular person’s, but it was as if everything she was capable of seeing was in focus at the same time. Functionally, she was now always staring directly at everything in front of her.

  While this was incredibly useful, such as how it allowed her to spot that dive bombing monster bird right before it tore Vin apart, that meant even if she didn’t want to be, she literally couldn’t help herself from staring at the dwarf’s severe burns unless she closed her eyes or turned fully away.

  She actually could turn her head a full one hundred and eighty degrees now, which was another cool thing about her new body. But it seemed like doing so wigged her friends out a bit, so she was trying to limit how often she did it.

  That way they wouldn’t get used to it and she could keep freaking them out.

  Other than her new vision and strange joints, the golem body had a few other interesting perks as well. For one, it was insanely durable. Alka had no idea what the librarian had made her golems out of, but seeing as a fistful of lava hadn’t even left a smudge on her, she felt pretty confident that she didn’t have to worry about breaking her new body. A part of her was sorely tempted to try scratching herself with the edge of her broken sword just to see which material was stronger, but she managed to hold off, if only barely.

  The last benefit seemed to be the fact that the golem clearly had some sort of built in translation magic. She’d been functionally unconscious during their whole adventure into the library of course, but Vin had given her a recap, and he’d mentioned how the golems had stated they had translation artifacts available upon request. Seeing as her connection to Vin was finally fully and truly severed, she should have lost the access Erik had given her to his Polyglot passive. The fact that she could still understand the infernals and the dwarves however meant that the golem body was taking care of that annoyance as well.

  All in all, she’d lucked out in quite an extreme fashion. When she’d spoken with Madam Trebella about potentially finding herself a new body, she’d figured it would be some sort of wooden puppet Vin managed to string together out of desperation. Waking up in this seemingly indestructible body filled to the brim with power was quite the pleasant surprise.

  Still… As amazing as it was to have a body again, she’d be lying if she didn’t admit the fact she couldn’t really feel much of anything besides pressure was a little disappointing.

  Though on the other hand, her friends were literally drowning in their own sweat at the moment, so being an unfeeling construct wasn’t all bad.

  Alka shook herself from her thoughts as they finally made their way out of town and headed down toward the massive pool of lava flowing within the center of the volcano. As they walked, the ground changed from paved roads to the natural rock of the volcano, and it wasn’t long before they’d reached the end of where it was clearly safe to stand. Deorer had been silent all this time, but the dwarf finally spoke up as they got closer.

  “Speak up if the lava starts damaging you,” he grunted, not bothering to turn around and look at her. “Being hit with a ball of lava is one thing. Wading through its currents is another.”

  “Will do,” Alka said, already used to her strange new voice that seemed to just emanate from around her head. She was admittedly curious as to just how loud she could make her voice, but she hadn’t really had the opportunity to shout at the top of her new magical lungs just yet.

  Maybe the next time Scule went to bed without Reginald…

  While she dreamed about giving the petian a heart attack, she watched Deorer step off the rock and directly into the lava, the dwarf completely unfazed by the searing molten rock and insane temperatures he had to have around his feet. Not waiting to see if she’d follow, he began wading forward, his pace slow but steady as the lava gradually rose up to the small man’s waist. She now understood why he wore that strange black armor. It wasn’t so much to protect his body as it was to protect his modesty. No doubt any sort of clothing or regular armor would be instantly burned or melted away regardless of what skills or passives the dwarf had.

  Mentally grinning at how cool this was, Alka left the cape Vin had lent her behind and walked after him, plunging her feet into the lava and pushing forward. Just like she’d been warned, the lava was in fact flowing like a slow but unstoppable river. Strength wise her new body was actually a good bit weaker than her old human one, which was unsurprising seeing as her strength had been in the 60’s before she’d died. In this new body, she had to concentrate to push one foot in front of the other as she followed after the master smith.

  Thankfully, it seemed as though not even wading through molten rock itself was enough to mar her new body, and Alka had no problem getting to their destination.

  Directly in the center of the lava flow was what Alka could only think of as the pieces of a workshop. There was a gleaming anvil made out of some strange black metal submerged almost entirely within the lava, a few racks of various tools strewn about all over the place, and a couple of odd-looking sealed barrels mostly submerged in lava, each one made of that same odd black metal.

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  “Take a seat,” Deorer grunted, turning and rifling through one of the piles of tools.

  Looking around, Alka didn’t see anything remotely resembling a chair. Before she could even ask, he grunted again.

  “On the anvil girl, don’t be daft.”

  Shrugging, Alka took a seat on the strange anvil, watching him search for something. “Out of curiosity, how can you tell I’m a girl?” Her new body certainly didn’t look particularly masculine or feminine in her opinion. She was curious if the master smith had some sort of strange magical sense that let him know from her bound soul.

  “You sound like a girl,” he grunted, finally finding what he was searching for and trudging through the lava over to her. Holding up something that looked like nothing more than a thin rod of gleaming black metal, he smacked it against her knee without warning.

  “Ow!” She cried, clutching her knee and trying to sound surprised. Unfortunately, Deorer wasn’t buying it, and he smacked her on the head with the rod as he frowned.

  “Didn’t I just tell you not to be daft?” He asked, smacking her arms next with the rod, followed quickly by her individual fingers. “I know you can’t feel pain. Do me a favor and sit there quietly until I’m done, or I won’t bother making you that sword you’re so keen on.”

  That certainly shut Alka up, and she sat silently through the rest of the smith’s examination. Once he’d finished smacking her around with that strange rod, he’d pulled out another tool that reminded her of two sharpened claws bound together. He used it to take various measurements of her different limbs, even going so far as to try scratching a tiny part of her form and grunting when it didn’t leave a mark. He seemed particularly interested in her strange ball joints, as despite his unchanging expression, those were what he spent the majority of his time focusing on.

  After nearly a full hour of the dwarf pulling out random tool after tool hidden within the lava flow, he finally took a step back, tossing his latest tool into the lava with a grunt and nodding.

  “Alright. I’m done.”

  Assuming that meant she could talk again, Alka leaned forward, brimming with curiosity. “Really? What am I made out of then?”

  “No clue,” he shrugged, before turning and wadding over to one of the nearby barrels.

  “No clue?” Alka repeated, staring at the dwarf in shock. “What do you mean, ‘no clue?’ Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of master smith?”

  “Yepp.”

  Alka shook her head, unable to believe what she was hearing. “You don’t even have a guess?”

  “Kid, you’re from another slag’en world,” Deorer said, fidgeting with the lid of the barrel. “All I can tell is that you’re made of some crazy magical alloy that puts anything I’ve ever made to shame, even before The Shattering. My darthsteel wasn’t even able to lay a scratch on you, which should only be the case with pure adamantine. And seeing as you sure as hell ain't made of adamantine, I don’t know what you’re made of.”

  “So I’m pretty much unstoppable?” Alka said, unable to hide the excitement in her voice.

  “What part of ‘don’t be daft’ are you struggling with exactly?” Deorer asked, finally turning and frowning at her. “You may be indestructible, but that’s a far cry from unstoppable. Don’t think I didn’t see you struggle to wade your way through the lava. I’d wager you’re about as strong as a freshly prestiged warrior at best, which means a well made weighted net could take you down.”

  “I’d just dodge the net,” Alka argued, crossing her arms and narrowing her strange new eyes at the dwarf.

  “Oh would you now?” Deorer grunted. Reaching into a pocket, he pulled out a strange new tool that looked like a long fork with only two prongs. Without warning, he smacked it against the barrel, causing a high-pitched sound to ring out.

  The moment the sound hit whatever Alka’s new body used as ears, everything went black.

  Alka panicked as she suddenly found herself in utter darkness, unable to see or feel anything at all. She somehow knew she was still within her golem body, but try as she might, none of her efforts to open her eyes or move her limbs seemed to do anything. If she still had lungs, she’d be having a full-blown panic attack right now at being blinded and sealed away within her new body.

  Thankfully, the horrifying trapped sensation only lasted a few seconds before her eyes flew open once again and she sat up, all but gasping as the world returned to her.

  For the first time since she’d met the dwarf, Deorer was clearly surprised as her movements startled him back a step.

  “What the hell was that?!” She cried, jumping off the anvil and preparing to rush the dwarf before he could do whatever he’d done a second time.

  “A warning that you’re not some unstoppable killing machine,” he said, peering at her curiously. “Though I have to admit, you’re damn close. This is a mana destabilizer,” he explained, holding up the odd-looking fork. “Used to sever the flow of active mana. We mainly use them to stop out of control spells and idiotic apprentices that can’t keep their runic formations stable. It should have shut you down for at least a few minutes, but you were barely out for five seconds. Whoever designed that golem must have included some sort of external mana shielding somehow… Fascinating.”

  “Do that again and we’ll see just how unstoppable of a killing machine I really am,” Alka said, glaring at the dwarf. She was glad the golem body gave her a more firm control over her basic movements, because she was absolutely certain she’d be visibly shaking right now if she was still in her human body. Being sealed away like that, unable to see or do anything…

  It was literally a fate worse than death.

  “Yeah yeah,” Deorer grunted, seemingly unconcerned about her threat to murder him. “I was hoping examining your body would give me the boost I needed, but frankly, I can’t make heads or tails of you.”

  “What boost?” Alka asked, forcing herself to uncross her arms and stand more confidently. She refused to let the dwarf see just how shaken his little show had made her.

  “I’ve been stuck at level 39 for the last two weeks,” Deorer admitted, cracking open the lid of the barrel and pulling out a gleaming ingot of black metal that almost seemed to absorb the light shining down from directly overhead. “Nothing I’ve tried is worthy of prestiging again it would seem.”

  Turning toward her with the strange ingot in hand, Deorer smiled for the first time, his thick teeth slightly crooked and his scarred face making his grin twisted and painful looking.

  “What say you and I try crafting a sword strong enough to impress the Gods?”

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