How would he have possibly articulated the pain of being burned alive?

Excruciating? Hopeless? Mind crushing? Eternal?

He didn’t have the pleasure of his nerve endings at least being burnt off after a while… if that could even be considered such a thing. In the end, he remained in a pile on the ground for hours as the endless fires slowly wore away his sense of touch entirely.

By the end of the first session, a constant 10 minutes… Ten whole fucking minutes of the torture, he already failed to feel the dirt around him. And his fingers shook unbelievably as though frightened that any action would cause endless pain. Just like before, everything throbbed violently, but not a single hair on his body had been harmed in the process. It was hell. No worse, but no better.

Escape wasn’t even an option.

Well, technically he could try, but he gained nothing from leaving besides losing the only person he’d met capable of mentoring him. Diavolo probably wouldn’t even let him escape. A stupid decision to perform that ritual early left him to withstand that hellfire for 10 minutes straight without a single reaction.

Only then could he prove to nature that he deserved the rune of the ox. And if he failed, well, it was exactly as Diavolo said.

There are only 2 chances. Once the far easier form is failed, wherein he just dipped an arm into the flames for mere second, the next test instead became a world of flames and heat which he had to endure for several minutes.

Then, if the test of a fiery atmosphere failed, he would never again receive chance to obtain runes from nature. It was a brutal requirement that normally required weeks of slow training to build up a practitioner’s resistance to the horrific pain.

Then they had to willingly grab a stone in regular flames, ignoring both the damage and pain. If one completed this task, they were of strong enough mind to complete this ritual.

The toughest ritual of all the ‘core’ runes.

At some point he even just considered giving up, rather early on as well since he spent every moment of it in fear of the next ‘burning’. He didn’t feel the slightest bit numb to it, instead his body simply hated itself and refused to do anything except lay there and accept everything. At some point, those considerations of giving up had vanished as he simply counted down the number of sessions left till it ended.

Towards the start, he screamed and shouted his throat out to no avail, but hereon only weak whimpers escaped. Then, those whimpers became sighs, as even the pain which he thought was so vivid just hours ago felt like a faint memory.

Now he could barely register the endless nettle stings all over his body. Nothing like the sensation of his skin literally being peeled off, but instead like a bug annoyingly biting him.

And after six hours of this, even that stopped mattering.

If Diavolo spoke more, perhaps some humour could have stopped his mind from melting during the process, but when it finally stopped and the elderly man picked him off the ground, it took more than a few minutes for him to remember what even happened. At some point he sort of just began daydreaming and completely ignored anything farther.

“You need some time to readjust. Try to not stick your hand into any fires by accident.” Joey came to somewhat, and titled his head in response. Was the man speaking from experience or concern?

No, it couldn’t be the latter after he burned for the last six hours. Although, he strangely didn’t feel any fear when he thought of fire. Just… Nothing.

He couldn’t care less if he never saw another flame. Likewise, he just couldn’t care if an inferno suddenly descended onto him and set the world ablaze. Diavolo even created a small fire over his hand, and while it stung enough to make him wince now that he became conscious of it again, the pain really didn’t matter.

Was he still okay?

“Perhaps… a lot of time. I received the Readers’ notes as well, if you have questions of arcane magic, now you should ask.”

On impulse, he asked the first question he remembered in monotone, “How is arcane magic different?” This was the one he cared for most as it effectively determined his interest in the new school of magic.

“It requires extreme precision. There is no will assisting you, and so everything is rigorous. They calculate the exact position of it all, the movements, forces, slightest breezes that we may not even feel, and use that unbelievable concept to produce something. There are no notes on what arcane magics appear as.”

“Alright, but what branches are there? For nature magic there is the sun and our runes, for example.”

“We only know of a few. Arcanists, who depend purely on numbers and mathematics. Thaumaturges, those who command nature through their minds and souls. Writers, who relied on a variety of languages to create mystical powers. And the Blood Mages, a strange variation who utilise a latent power within them, and then enhance it to incredible means. Of them, we only have knowledge on Blood Mages. Their path was created on the belief that dark magic may be used virtuously by placing all the suffering on the practitioner, it is a hellish path as the pain you feel is rooted in your very soul. Try to avoid such a thing if you find it.”

He listened to Diavolo mostly read off the scroll regarding some sparse knowledge on Arcane magic. While they knew very little about specifics, there was actually a fair bit about the towers and what sorts of things he could expect.

If still intact, kinder arcane practitioners only confirmed an outsiders talent and then allowed them to become an apprentice on the spot, even without a confirmation of character. This could be tested overtime to ensure the apprentice may be trusted.

However, some more demanding practitioners made tests which required someone with little to no magical knowledge prove their ability to grasp knowledge. Given the standard of science and mathematics in this world, he didn’t believe that even the most demanding Arcanist would give a problem too hard to learn.

After all, they might have compendiums discussing complex analysis or set theory, but from the brief time he spent learning that stuff…

There was no way a young man on this world possibly grasped that in less than several years of study.

He received some more knowledge from the scroll about this situation, and overtime felt his sense of touch slowly revert to normal. The tilled ground beneath his feet now actually felt like soil now, and no longer a cold, thick liquid wrapped around his toes.

Was he really fucked in the head for actually being able to move past that sort of torture so easily?

Or was there something special about the fire which stopped it creating lasting trauma?

He preferred the latter, it made him seem normal still.

However, before Diavolo allowed him to leave, the mottled elderly man raised a hand and created a large fire between them. That resembling a bonfire in his eyes, and it was automatically clear what had to be done. First, his hand reached forward, and when the flames brushed against his skin it certainly stung. But not soon after that pain numbed, and the hand slowly moved deeper and deeper, finally, his whole arm submerged into the flame and he received an approving nod. Now, he was sure that Joey would pass the far tougher version of this ritual.

Although, if given his way it’d be a good few days before the young man received another chance. There’d be more of this suffering until he could remain completely calm without even the slightest movements, and only then would he be qualified to create a rune of the ox.

No matter though. It’d just passed mid-day and everyone had their own things to do for now. Joey returned to the chief and presented a fair bit of dynamite to the man, but he didn’t seem all that surprised.

Go figure. Explosives using nitro-gel weren’t exactly the most ingenious concept.

However, Joey’s information on the golems’ state was far more valuable. One already broke down completely, whilst the other long since rusted and somewhat decayed. The only issue was that it still seemed fully functional, therefore it had to be broken first.

“We do have a way to fight those machinations, but it is only a temporary measure. I will send three elite warriors with you, I trust a team of four with these weapons can slay a single golem.” Joey made no promises, especially as he lacked any proper weaponry or magic like the others. However, the chief followed up with, “Borrow one of our spears. You’ve done amazing for your self-sufficiency, but it means nothing against these things.” With a gracious thanks, he was allowed to collect one of the black spears from an elite warrior.

Just from holding it, he felt a new source of power in his arms, like any stab or slice would be twice as fast at the minimum.

Not just that, but whilst the spear felt heavy, it could be swing around with ease like a stick. For just a single rune engraved into the spear-tip, he admitted how scary such a thing was.

And he wondered what sort of improved weapons he’d eventually create with the cube.

“Thank you. As promised the parts belong to your village, although, I do hope you could provide some smelted iron. It would help me along when this is done.”

“Is that all? Just ask for some, we’re always trying to use more of that, but steel-working is too harsh on most of them.” he spoke of those at the workshop. As that happened, Joey realised that three elite warriors appeared behind him, two of which he recognised. “I believed it best for you to work with those you know. Kalgon and Gyrren you know. Between them is Ashvard, he is one of our older elite warriors, and one of the few with experience against the Forger’s machines.”

As well as this, Ashvard held a clay jar of some substance, what he believed to be their preparation against this golem.

“Bramble wood sap mixed with death warrior bone char and Glowing bluebell nectar, it creates a liquid which hardens in response to movement. Store it.” As he took the large clay jar, the sound of a gently sloshing fluid could be felt, and he tapped it against the cube to quickly put an end to such movement.

The use of such a fluid was obvious, as it dripped between a golem’s gears, it would be completely unable to move. Of course, a more intact one might easily destroy the hardened substance, or retreat into the workshop for recovery.

With everyone in the group ready for set off, it only took a short few minutes for him to request some iron from those at the workshop and receive a small stack of them without a single question. While he knew nothing about iron based on appearance alone, it was interesting to see that the cube deemed everything he just acquired as ‘pig iron’, which was expected to a certain degree. However, with the exchangeability of most recipes, he believed that any sort of iron-heavy ingot would be ideal for these recipes. After all, an ingot of 100% pure iron would be incredibly hard to manufacture with his technology.

Or lack thereof, to be precise.

With 6 ingots in his cube now, it easily fulfilled his early needs over the next few days. While he might have been hesitant in directly asking for a material like this in the past, on account of how it felt like he was cheating the cube’s methodology.

It felt easier to do so when every single thing currently holding him back was what he was simply a step away from acquiring. In which case, so what if he got some iron now instead of tomorrow?

Everyone set off for the mines with haste, although Joey really felt his slower speed now more than ever with everyone purposely slowing down every minute to allow him to catch up. At the very least he only panted heavily a bit whilst sprinting like this, although that need for air grew as they finally crossed the gravel tree forest into the brown barked one. While he remembered the chief mentioned the name of these trees whilst looking at the map, he hadn’t taken specific note of it, and completely forgot.

He saw the river beside him, as well as the sprawling dark forest with its thick canopy. For some reason it felt as though things from within were staring at him, waiting for him to step inside… and meet his death.

“The mine is just up ahead, what’s the tactic for fighting these things?”

Ashvard turned around and moved the group together, talking quietly so that nothing heard his voice. “Golems only have a single weak point. Their power source inside their heads, attack it immediately if you see it. Even if it’s damaged, the rest of the body is just as valuable in the end. As for other attacks, out spears cannot pierce its armour, so you must aim for gaps or whatever the explosions blow off. DO NOT every block its attacks, dodge and draw its attention before it attacks someone. Understood?”

While they all nodded, Ashvard clearly only really spoke to the other two elites and Joey didn’t disagree with this in the slightest. He was an unwieldy, and untrained individual who simply could not compare to everyone else in this group.

The fact he was even here is a miracle on its own. At best he might distract the golem every now and then whilst the three more competent fighters took it down. And that was precisely why he gave all the spoils to the village.

With that all in mind, everyone took 2 dynamite sticks and approached the cave with a flaming stick. It was quietly stuck into the stone riverbank and all four lit a single stick as quietly as possible. For now remaining just outside of the golem’s sight, and threw towards the mechanical guard rather precisely.

Joey, with less experience in throwing explosives ended up with his landing a small distance from the golem. Everyone saw how it didn’t really react at first, instead its glowing eyes narrowed and dilated repeatedly whilst staring at the burning fuses… And then a blast rocked the mine’s walls! Dust and stone erupted out of the entrance, and the golem walked through it, still intact.

Something attacked it. And that meant an enemy was near the mine they had to protect.

Its eyes easily saw through the cloud of smoke and dust, noticing the group of four humans not far away who held another stick of dynamite. And while it moved forward, the thing noticed that parts of its legs had broken down, removing its ability to sprint.

No matter though, as no vital systems had been damaged. It reacted to another stick being thrown towards it, using all the spare power in its legs to leap away, now right next to the group of humans. The group of its enemies.

However, before it could blast off their puny heads, the other three lit their sticks of dynamite and tightly held it…

They ran and it tried to chase with a leap, but soon found itself landing in an extremely disadvantageous position. Three sticks of dynamite already met its landing spot, and the golem simply had no way to change its movement in mid-air.

The four humans covered their ears whilst escaping the blast range. And right after the large detonation blew past them, all four drew on black tipped spears to fight their opponent. One of them even held a jar of some liquid, but by the minute it seemed less necessary to use it.

Not that they wouldn’t. Against a golem, every action might be the difference between life and death.