Angel spent the next several days making good on his promise. He barely ever left the room as he sorted through all the discarded artifacts, cataloguing and studying any runes or Old World Magic patterns that he’d yet to learn.

Without the help of his new System artifact, it would have been impossible to finish in time. Even with his tireless work, the room shrunk at a maddeningly slow pace. Lilian often showed up at the door to watch him work for several minutes before returning to whatever she was doing in the main hall.

Angel’s efforts, as tedious as they were, started to pay dividends quickly. With every new rune, a tiny piece of an enormous puzzle clicked into place. While most men would have grown tired or bored, his excitement only grew with every passing hour. Lilian often had to remind him to eat after he skipped several meals engrossed in drawing out a rune’s true purpose. He barely slept for more than a few hours each night, unable to keep himself asleep with so much potential knowledge waiting for him.

It took Angel around five days to get through a quarter of the room. In the same time, his artifact had scanned the remainder of it and compiled a several page list of every piece of information it deemed important.

After reviewing the list and spending some time associating it with his current knowledge, Angel sat back and let out a shaky breath. His hands trembled slightly in a mixture of excitement and exhaustion.

“Angel?” Lilian asked, glancing at him from the edge of the hall. “Are you okay? You’ve been staring at the wall for nearly ten minutes.”

“I’ve never been better,” Angel said, running a hand through his hair and drawing in a deep breath. “This is just unbelievable. There are so many artifacts here that, even with the abysmal rate of taking them apart to learn how they work, I’ve still managed to learn more than I have in the last several years. I’m so close, Lilian. Everything is falling into place. I’m just missing a few tiny little pieces.”

“You sound like a lunatic,” Lilian observed. “And that should mean a lot, coming from the six hundred year old murderer with no feelings. How much did you sleep tonight?”

“I didn’t,” Angel said, picking up a plate of copper and staring at his bedraggled reflection in it. “Far too much work to do. Sleep can wait.”

Even as he spoke, a yawn forced its way out of his lips. As soon as Angel closed his eyes, a wave of dizziness washed over him. He desperately tried to stay awake, but his traitorous body rebelled against his mind, casting it down into a pit of darkness. He slumped forward, collapsing in a snoring pile on the ground.

When Angel awoke again, he was lying on something soft. He blinked, his mind trying to catch up with the events of the last week. His cheek was pressed against his travel blanket, and a cold metal wall rose up a short distance from his nose.

He rolled over with a groan. Lilian sat a short distance away from him in the tall chair before the monitors. She glanced over as he pushed himself upright.

“How long did I sleep?” Angel asked.

“Nearly an entire day,” Lilian replied, tapping the screen and bringing a new window up. “I’m just shocked you lasted that long without crashing.”

“This place is like a dream come true,” Angel said as he rose to his feet and brushed his clothes off. “I can’t waste the time I’ve got here. Speaking of which…”

His eyes alighted on the piece of copper that he’d grabbed shortly before passing out. Lilian had brought it up with him. He grabbed it, taking his scribe in the other hand as he started to carve magic into the plate.

After just under an hour of work, he was done. Angel rocked back, returning his scribe to its place and running his fingers over the carvings he’d put into the metal.

“What’s that?” Lilian asked.

“Old World Magic,” Angel breathed. He brought a mote of energy to the palm of his left hand and pressed it into a circle of runes on the center of the plate. Energy ran down, expanding outwards radially and lighting up piece by piece. “Behold!”

A hum emitted from the plate, growing in intensity with every passing second. And then, just as it reached its crescendo, it vanished. The light blinked out, leaving Angel staring at it in bewilderment.

“Wow. That was really impressive,” Lilian said, completely unimpressed.

“I don’t get it,” Angel said, baffled. He scanned over the runes again and shook his head. “No, I’m certain. The runes are right. This should be basic as far as Old World Magic goes. It’s just drawing the ambient energy in the air to keep some lines lit. The spark of energy I put into it should have been enough to keep it running.”

He sent another orb of magic into the plate, but it achieved the same results. Angel pressed his lips together and let out a contemplative hum. “I don’t get it. That pattern was almost completely copied from a broken artifact.”

“Well, it was broken,” Lilian pointed out.

“Not in that way. There was damage, but I confirmed each rune. I’m confident I got it right.”

“Well, maybe it’s because you don’t have a real power source?” Lilian offered. “I mean, you just sent a spark of energy into the plate. There’s no actual energy storage.”

“This pattern shouldn’t need a storage,” Angel said, crossing his arms. “That was the whole point. It draws energy from the environment, eliminating the need for a storage. Or at least, that’s what it should have done.”

“You know, Soul mentioned of the same nature at some point,” Lilian said, cocking her head to the side in thought. “He wasn’t particularly talkative about it, but I do remember some of the artifacts we used breaking more often. He insisted that it was the artifacts themselves, but we figured that we’d just gotten too strong to use them safely.”

“Do you remember what artifacts they were?” Angel asked, setting the plate down.

“Not exactly. It was almost two hundred years ago,” Lilian said, rubbing the back of her head. “But I don’t think they had an energy storage either. I could be wrong, though.”

“Interesting,” Angel muttered. “Well, as disappointing as that is, I’ve still made enormous progress. I’d like to upgrade my arm before we leave. But, before that, what have you been up to?”

Lilian waved to the screen and the three dimensional head formed once more.

“Please bring up the information I gathered,” Lilian told it, rising from her chair and gesturing for Angel to sit down. “I’ve compiled as much as I could find about all of the members of the Reawakening. Knowing what we’re up against will hopefully be of use.”

“Perfect,” Angel said, sliding into the chair. There was a flash of doubt in his mind as he wondered if Lilian had gathered real data or if this was just another plot. He banished it with a thought. The decision to trust her had already been made. If she was going to betray him again, he’d deal with it when it happened.

A window with an image of Reave appeared before him on the screen. His two mechanical wings stretched out behind his back, energy crackling down them.

“Reave is known as the Blade of the Reawakening,” the terminal head said. “He is the most adept at combat out of the Reawakening and possesses Old World Magic that allows him to control plasma. His abilities cause him enormous pain, so he does not often use them at full strength.”

“Wait,” Angel said, holding a hand up. “You’re telling me that he wasn’t trying when we fought? Like, I know he wasn’t doing his best, but…”

“He was barely at ten percent of his strength, if I had to guess,” Lilian said. “I’ve only seen him use his full power twice, and both were during the Great War. Every time he channels the plasma, it ravages his body. That’s why it’s all bandaged.”

“I’d feel bad for him if he weren’t a mass murderer,” Angel said, but he let out a sigh. “That doesn’t bode well for us in an all-out fight.”