I flew through the air as the giant train-car golem slammed its fist down. The track buckled below it; my Charge Blade barely even dented the monstrosity. A second before I hit the rough gravel trainyard, something yanked me in the other direction, and I zipped right back toward the boss.

  The Track’s Custodian: Level 29 Dungeon Boss

  Tori let her Pull spell go and dropped a Gravity Well below the golem’s feet. It pulled both it and me down toward the ground, and I swung my blade for all I was worth, aiming for the exposed coupling on its leg. I activated the blade as it hit. Screeching sounds filled the air as metal tore against metal.

  I’d been working on that joint for a while, but it was still a shock when the limb gave and the boss collapsed. Tori Crushed the golem’s head, and a moment later, the messages rolled in.

  Boss Defeated: The Track’s Custodian

  Level Up! 37 to 38

  Tori cheered. “Thirty-One! Getting there!”

  “Yes, you are,” I agreed. More importantly than the levels, she was starting to master her spells—and not just as an offensive-minded mage. Her telekinetic magic was perfect for supporting my attacks and keeping me out of danger—she’d wanted to build Calvin as a support, but she’d unwittingly made herself into one instead. Her Push and Pull had been critical for making the Track’s Custodian as easy a fight as it had been.

  It had almost been too easy, in fact. Tori seemed almost bored. I took one glance at our loot and shrugged it off. Both pieces were bad for us, and I already had plenty of gear to de-Charge. I wanted to make sure she agreed before I took them, though, even if I had other plans for both.

  Tome of Arsenal (Common)

  +1 Awareness

  User learns the spell Arsenal, which allows the caster to apply a variety of useful buffs to both weapons and tools. These buffs last for eight hours, but the caster’s Body is temporarily reduced by two for each buff beyond the first. The tome remains intact, but loses its ability to transfer magic after use.

  Pulse of the City (Rare, Charge 10)

  +3 Mana, +3 Awareness

  The wearer may stabilize an injured person’s condition by maintaining physical contact with either their wrists or neck. This effect breaks if the injured person takes damage.

  Tori’s mood soured, too. “What a bunch of junk,” she said. She turned back toward the train station’s entrance.

  I scooped both into my inventory; they were bad for us, but the Pulse would be perfect for Jessica, and the Tome of Arsenal was something Calvin might actually use. He didn’t care about his stats; in fact, he hadn’t left Museumtown since the night we’d arrived except to hunt briefly for the twins. I had some idea what he was up to, and it wasn’t dungeon crawling.

  It had to be close to three in the morning, but Tori wasn’t slowing down. I hurried to keep up with her as she headed for the Boneyard’s entrance. I was feeling it, though. This was my third dungeon of the day, and I’d fought the Cloud Sentinel, too. “Tori, let’s stop and take a breather for a minute,” I said.

  “I’m almost caught up, though.”

  “Yeah, but we don’t want to have to drag ourselves over the finish line. We’ll call it for the night, then head back to Museumtown tomorrow morning.”

  Tori hesitated at the dungeon’s exit. “And then the Planetarium?”

  I thought about it. The answer was no; I already knew that. But how could I justify it? The first floor and boss hadn’t been any tougher than the single-boss dungeon we’d just cleared; there was no reason Tori and I couldn’t clear the rest of it.

  Except for Jessica. Jessica was the reason. Tori’s step-mom was right; pushing that hard could be too dangerous—not because we couldn’t handle the Void’s Embrace, but because we had no idea who else might be inside of it. A team with smarter leadership than Eddie could probably kill us both, and there was no way Tommy hadn’t told his boss about me. He’d have every dungeon entrance in his territory watched.

  I needed the levels. But I didn’t need to take that kind of risk—and I definitely didn’t need to be risking Tori.

  “Tell you what, Tori. You let me do some smithing, and we’ll see if we can get you to Thirty-Three or Thirty-Four before we go back. One more Tier One should do it.”

  That was an obvious misdirection, but Tori was as tired as I was, even if she wasn’t showing it. “Deal. But it better be a good one.”

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Having most of my tools felt like heaven.

  So did the Charge I’d pulled from shredding a pair of common items I’d looted. Between the two, I’d gone from one point of available Charge to twenty-nine—a massive wealth of power to distribute. I’d also pulled the Charge Blade itself apart; I needed the available power more than I needed it as a weapon.

  I had a plan for at least twenty of my Charge.

  First, though, I opened the Voltsmith’s Box from clearing the first floor of the Void’s Embrace. I’d expected to get another pile of assorted non-magical odds and ends, and maybe another manual, but instead, I received a trio of round, bronze batteries and a single emitter much like the one I’d gotten from the first Imbuing Rod. That brought my total number of available batteries to five—including the ones in the Charge Blade—and my emitters to two.

  And that gave me an idea.

  In addition to the kids’ dirt bike engine, I’d grabbed a full axle from one of the abandoned cars at Cindy’s. It was a lot longer than I needed it to be, and it weighed a lot more than the pipe I’d used for the first Trip-Hammer and the Charge Blade, but it’d work as a handle. It’d also give me more reach, and I had the Body to swing it around.

  The axle hit the asphalt in the trainyard’s parking lot, followed by the motor. I immediately prised that open, working wires through it and attaching the emitters on either side of the cylinders. If I was right—and I was pretty sure I was right—the whole thing could run on Charge. It’d take some redesign, but I knew how combustion engines worked, and I could fake the explosion inside the cylinders. That’d provide the power.

  Once both wire circuits were in place, I installed the emitters inside the engine’s case, right above the cylinders. I could already see how the Charge would flow into the emitter, fire into the cylinder, and be reabsorbed by the wiring on the far side. The force of the Charge’s impact would drive the whole engine.

  I attached the first battery and worked on the trigger. This one wouldn’t be permanent, and I pushed a single point of Charge into it. The whole circuit lit up faintly in the early morning darkness. I activated the machine.

  Right away, I saw a problem. Two, actually, but the first one was just a symptom of not using enough power yet. The engine’s top speed was low. Painfully low. It sounded like a chainsaw starting up, not a dirt bike running flat-out. That was fine, though.

  More concerning was the time it took to reach even that low speed. It took nearly three seconds, not a problem for someone turning a key on a bike, but an eternity in a fight with, say, a thirty-foot-tall golem made of train cars. I set that problem aside for now, though. It was an optimization, and I was still prototyping.

  “Tori, hold this,” I said, pointing to the engine-axle combination. “Don’t let anything move, or I’ll need to start over.”

  As she kept a grip on the device, I worked the wiring down toward the axle’s mid-point, then all the way to the heavy butt. I fired up the Voltsmith’s Grasp and started boring a pair of holes in the axle. Once they were about as deep as I could get them without cutting all the way through, I installed two of the charge batteries before covering them with steel scrap. I bolted everything in place with my wrenches, then covered the wiring in electrical tape all the way up and down the weapon.

  I still hadn’t figured out a way to guarantee I’d be able to rev it up instantly, but I had an idea. I attached the hammers, this time lining them up one hundred eighty degrees opposite each other so one would be right against the handle and the other above it. The old ratchet plates came out of my inventory.

  Then, I had a decision to make. I could go with the same spikes I’d used before. They absolutely tore through armor, and they were still pretty lethal against everything else. But I wanted to upgrade this thing down the line once I had more emitters.

  While I pondered that, I decided to test the machine’s acceleration and power with a full twenty Charge. I filled both batteries as full as they’d go and revved it up.

  A second and a half later, it was howling away. I engaged the ratchet plates, and both hammers snapped halfway around their rotation, then slammed to a stop that jarred my wrists and elbows.

  Perfect.

  Almost perfect. The power was right where I wanted it to be; even without the hammer claws, this thing would be devastating. The acceleration wasn’t where it needed to be, though, and I couldn’t add more power to it. The engine had almost shaken itself apart from twenty Charge. Thirty would be too much.

  Thirty all at once would be too much.

  The answer had been in my hand the whole time. I shut the engine off, then poured power into it from my gauntlet while starting it. An orange flash nearly blinded me, but the new Trip-Hammer was thundering along at full power in less than a second. I checked my gauntlet’s remaining power, then what I had in my own reserves.

  Stored Charge 12/15

  Charge - 9/44 (35 used)

  That was acceptable—for now. I still hadn’t figured out how to make the hammerheads upgradable, but swinging two sledgehammers at these speeds would be enough until I did. I cleaned up my workspace and shoved the Trip-Hammer into my inventory.

  Heavy Trip-Hammer, by Hal Riley (Created Item, Charge 20)

  The Trip-Hammer uses magical energy, external power sources, and salvaged parts to apply incredible destructive force to a small area. First created by Hal Riley of Earth.

  Tori tapped her foot impatiently by the dungeon’s entrance. “You finished yet?”

  “Almost.” I pulled up my stat screen to take a look.

  [Hal Riley] [Class - Voltsmith] [Level - 38]

  [Stats]

  ?Body - 22

  ?Awareness - 42

  ?Charge - 9/44 (35 Used)

  Stat Points Available: 0

  [Class Skill - Decharge/Recharge - Drain the charge from magic items to power your own creations]

  Items

  ?Fast-Hoof Boots

  ?Voltsmith’s Grasp (15 Charge) - 0/3 Taser Launchers Loaded

  ?Heavy Trip-Hammer (20 Charge)

  The amount of points I’d put into Charge recently concerned me, but I needed them all to make this work. Synergistic system or not, Voltsmith was starting to seem like a single-stat class. I wasn’t sure I liked that; my Body was starting to get too low for comfort—at least in comparison to my other stats.

  “I could have partnered up with someone with a normal class, but no, I had to find the one guy who needs to sit around every five minutes to tinker with his gear,” Tori complained.

  I was about to start arguing when a new message came in.

  Area Message: The Void’s Embrace’s second floor has been cleared. The first Tier Two Dungeon in the [Chicago] area has been fully cleared.

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