The sun had barely risen, tingeing the sky orange and pink, when Nyran was already sweating on the training grounds of Victory Ridge. The morning air still held the night's coolness, mixed with the smell of packed earth and sweat. Every thrust of her spear against the wooden post was an effort to disguise her true mission: to discover the secret behind the quilombo's victory over the governor's army.

  Everything here seems like a normal quilombo... she thought, her eyes discreetly scanning her surroundings. But, every now and then, I see those carts covered with thick cloth going up the ridge. They always head to a restricted training area. Her ears caught a muffled boom in the distance, followed by a slight tremor in the ground. Another explosion. Must be those magical weapons. And they're bringing more of them every day. This is... dangerous.

  At the peak of her training, the guard ícaro approached. His steps were muffled by the soft earth until he stopped beside her.

  "Nyran," he called, his tone both casual and inquisitive. "Specter told me you're skilled in wind and fire magic. And that your mana is remarkable. Is it true?"

  Nyran planted her spear into the ground with a sharp movement. The blade sank into the earth, and she straightened her back, raising her chin with a deliberately neutral expression.

  "Yes, sir."

  "Excellent," he replied, a brief smile crossing his face. "Then, please, come with me. Chief Carlos wants to speak with you."

  A chief? Finally, an opportunity to get better information.

  They descended Victory Ridge, and the path opened towards the Armadillo Mocambo. Nyran observed everything attentively. Several men passed them, pushing one-wheeled carts with wheels made of a dark, smooth material she didn't recognize—neither wood nor common metal. The loads were covered with grimy cloths.

  We're heading precisely to the place these carts come from... So, the origin of these weapons is in the Armadillo Mocambo.

  Slowly, she entered the mocambo. As it was still early, it wasn't bustling, but life was already pulsing. The smell of fresh bread and burning firewood came from some houses. People were sweeping the sidewalks, and the soft sound of brooms mixed with the rustling of leaves from the trees lining the streets, their shadows lengthening on the packed earth.

  Pretty and well-ordered. It seems everything here was carefully planned.

  As they walked, she spotted in the distance a man wearing blue gloves made of a strange, flexible, and shiny material, removing buckets from a public toilet and placing them on a cart similar to the others.

  It seems the chief here takes cleanliness seriously.

  As they approached, the man turned a corner and disappeared from view. Shortly after, Nyran and ícaro came across an unexpected scene: hundreds of people were walking through the streets, all heading in the same direction. A low murmur of conversation filled the air.

  Is there a festival? At this hour?

  They joined the crowd. Nyran noticed men and women entering large sheds. One of them, under construction, was being raised with a material that looked like smooth, uniform stone, something she had never seen. The smell of wet clay and lime was strong on the site.

  Finally, they turned a corner and reached their destination. What Nyran saw made her stop for a moment. Leaning against the wall of a shed was a steel monstrosity shaped like a giant egg, larger than a house. On the ground, another iron structure roared and hissed, with exposed gears moving rhythmically. The heat emanating from it was intense, heated by several fire gems glowing with an incandescent orange light at its base.

  My God, she thought, feeling sweat on the nape of her neck from the radiant heat. Why would anyone make something so useless with such an expensive material? And where did they get so much iron for this? I thought the chief was a practical man, but this seems like a monumental waste.

  In front of the steel "egg," a man—whom she presumed was Chief Carlos—was arguing with a dark-haired woman with a ponytail and thick leather gloves. Other workers, their faces marked by toil and clothes smudged with soot, watched them.

  "Chief, I thought we would use the iron ore to produce steel. It's the right way," argued the woman, crossing her arms.

  Carlos shook his head, a glint of conviction in his eyes.

  "Unfortunately, we don't have iron ore in quantity here. But I thought of a method using the very iron bars we buy. With the Fire Gem, we can melt them to create an artificial pig iron and control the carbon with charcoal and spiegel alloy. The only problem was the manganese for the alloy, but luckily for us, the Northeast has veins of pyrolusite, which is rich in manganese, near clay sources. I sent a team to look, and they found a vein nearby!"

  Nyran listened to everything, each word etched into her mind. ícaro, beside her, waited patiently until Carlos paused.

  "Good morning, Chief!" ícaro announced, getting his attention. "This is Nyran, the adept you asked for."

  Carlos turned, and his face lit up with an open smile. His eyes scrutinized the newcomer, who maintained a rigid posture and an inscrutable expression.

  "Pleasure! I'm Carlos, Chief of the Armadillo Burrow. And I'm going to need your help here a lot," he said, with an energetic tone. "So much so, that I hope you'll come live with us. And don't worry, you'll receive a good salary for using the magic gems, plus a hazard pay bonus!"

  Salary? Nyran thought, ironically. I already get 'my salary' from Caetano Velho.

  "Thank you, Chief. I'll do my best," she replied, keeping her voice neutral and her face expressionless.

  Carlos nodded, satisfied, and then turned his attention back to the workers, rubbing his hands together.

  "Alright, everyone! With Nyran's help, we can begin!"

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  He climbed a metal ladder to a platform where a crucible furnace was positioned right above the mouth of the strange steel "egg." From there, he threw several bars of a dark, brittle alloy into the crucible.

  "This is the spiegel alloy we prepared earlier, with the manganese we reduced from the pyrolusite!" he explained loudly for all to hear. Then, he pointed to a worker, who climbed up and carefully placed a gloved hand on a Fire Gem embedded in the furnace base. Immediately, the gem glowed intensely, and the furnace began radiating visible heat, making the air around it shimmer.

  "This alloy has to be perfect for when it's added to the Bessemer converter!" Carlos shouted over the noise beginning to emanate from the equipment.

  He then moved across the platform to another structure, a blast furnace. Around it were stacks of common iron bars and piles of powdered charcoal. Carlos directed other workers to load the furnace, and another adept, with another Fire Gem, activated the heat. The air filled with the heavy smell of heating metal and burning charcoal.

  Nyran watched it all, her eyes tracing every movement. On the outside, she seemed like an ice statue. Inside, confusion seethed.

  What the hell is happening here? Is this some form of alchemy? Why does no one else seem to think this is complete madness?

  When the interior of the blast furnace glowed with the white-orange light of molten iron—the so-called "artificial pig iron"—Carlos descended the ladder and approached a black, noisy machine spewing jets of steam.

  "Now is the time!" he announced, placing his hand on a robust red lever. "Let's pour the pig iron into the converter! For that... we pull the red lever on the steam engine!"

  He pulled the lever forcefully. A deep, mechanical roar echoed, and Nyran saw a complex system of gears and belts moving. The blast furnace lid opened with a metallic creak, and a cascade of incandescent metal, bright as a miniature sun, gushed down a refractory channel straight into the mouth of the steel "egg." The heat was so intense she felt her skin burning even at a distance.

  "Nyran!" called the dark-haired woman, handing her a staff with a Wind Gem embedded in it. "Please, use the gem and blow into this inlet!" she indicated an iron tube leading to the base of the converter.

  Nyran took the staff. She felt the smooth wood in her hands and the light vibration of the gem. Concentrating, she channeled her mana. A jet of concentrated, powerful air hissed into the tube, and the converter seemed to come alive, with a deeper roar and flames dancing at its mouth.

  Back up on the platform, Carlos watched the process with fixed eyes, shouting orders.

  "Right, now! Blue lever!" a worker pulled a blue lever. A mechanism of chains and cogwheels sprang into action, and the crucible furnace, now containing the molten spiegel alloy, moved slowly on rails, positioning itself precisely over the converter's mouth. The crucible tilted, and a stream of shiny metal, different from the previous one, poured into the converter. "Perfect! Now we just wait for the process to finish!"

  The converter's roar changed pitch, becoming smoother. After a few minutes, Carlos gave the final order.

  "Now, pull the red lever again!"

  This time, the large "oval steel machine" began to move. With a metallic groan, it tilted to the side. From its mouth, a river of liquid, shining steel gushed out, flowing into a series of sand molds at the base. The metal was dazzling, shimmering like incandescent silver water, until, slowly, it began to darken and solidify, taking the shape of thousands of regular bars.

  The hot, metallic smell impregnated the air. When the bars were cool enough to handle, Nia, incredulous, approached. She picked one up. It was heavy, smooth, and had the characteristic bluish-gray hue. She tapped it lightly against another. The clear, sharp ting, without any brittleness, confirmed her suspicion.

  "I don't believe it..." the word came out as a hoarse whisper from her lips, her impassive facade finally cracking. "I have to pound iron for days to get a handful of decent steel... The import price is a fortune... And you... you made thousands of bars... in minutes! Just this pile here must be worth a fortune!"

  Carlos approached, wiping his sooty hands on a cloth.

  "Yeah, that's the price we pay for imported steel," he explained, nodding. "But we can't sell it for the same value. We need to use a good part of this steel to build more machines, more tools. But the other half... that one, we will sell. And with the profit, we'll hire more people and raise everyone's salary here in the mocambo. Who knows, one day, everyone here might earn as much as a wealthy free man!"

  Euphoria took hold of the workers. Wide smiles, slaps on the back, a renewed zeal for work. The day continued at a frantic and productive pace.

  At the end of her shift, exhausted but with her mind racing, Nyran was released. As she walked back through the mocambo's tranquil streets, now lit by the golden late afternoon light, her thoughts seethed.

  I have to report this immediately to Caetano Velho... But I'm still being watched. I need to wait for the right opportunity. I know he already foresaw something like this. I just need to be patient.

  Her eyes scanned the clean sidewalks, the well-kept houses, when, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted something that made her heart stop. A tall woman, wearing a simple dress, with blue vertical stripes, but of an unmistakably familiar cut—just like the one her warrior sisters. Wore.

  A sister? Here? Impossible!

  Without thinking, she turned and began to follow the woman, who walked with quick, determined steps. The woman entered a small shack at the edge of an open field of well-trimmed grass, marked with white lines.

  Nyran hesitated to enter. Several other women were entering the place, laughing and talking. She couldn't risk it. There were wooden benches around the field, and some people were already seated, forming a small audience. She decided to sit and wait.

  It didn't take long. The woman she was waiting for came out of the shack, but now she was wearing an absurdly short outfit—shorts that barely passed her thighs and a green shirt. It was her, without a doubt. Tassi.

  "Who do you think will win today's match?" Nyran heard a woman say on the bench behind her. "I bet the Fine Clothes team will win hands down!"

  "No way!" retorted another beside her. "Tassi's team, the Forest Green, is going to win!"

  "Bah!" grunted a man behind them, in a gruff voice. "Doesn't matter. My team, Team Explosion, would thrash any of these women's teams! Even Team Hard Stone would beat them."

  "You say that because you've never seen Quixotina on the field!" the first woman retorted, laughing. "She dribbles past anyone!"

  As the friendly argument continued, Nyran watched, perplexed. Tassi, in the center of the field, pointed at another woman, the so-called Quixotina.

  "You hear that, Quixotina?" shouted Tassi, with a broad smile Nyran never imagined she'd see on her face. "My team is more important on and off the field! We feed everyone! But today, you're going to be eating only grass!"

  Quixotina, a woman of smaller stature but with an air of determination, wasn't fazed.

  "You may feed the belly, Tassi," she replied, raising her voice. "But we feed the soul with knowledge! And we also clothe everyone!"

  Some women on the team laughed upon hearing their exchange, while others tried to hide their faces in embarrassment.

  The game began. It was chaotic, noisy, and full of energy. Women ran, kicked a rubber ball, shouted, laughed. Nyran saw Tassi, the same hard and disciplined woman she had known, laughing openly, getting dirty with earth, celebrating with her teammates. It was a side of her Nyran didn't even know existed.

  Tassi's team, Forest Green, ultimately won. After all, most of the farmers didn't have to spend the whole day tending the fields thanks to Tassi's powers and could spend time playing or doing other activities. But even so, the match was hard-fought.

  When it ended, the women, sweaty and happy, went to change. Nyran waited, her heart pounding. When she saw Tassi come out, back in her normal dress, she approached slowly, ensuring no one was nearby.

  "Tassi?" she called, in a whisper laden with incredulity.

  The woman turned, and her eyes, which moments before had shone with fun, met Nyran's. Tassi's expression transformed instantly. The smile vanished, replaced by a look of alertness and recognition. The world around them seemed to stop.