I woke up to sunlight.

  Blinked.

  And immediately realized something was wrong.

  I was on a barge.

  Noxus was standing nearby, calmly chewing something out of a sack.

  “How…” I started.

  “When you’re asleep,” Noxus cut in, “you don’t notice anything at all. Liara picked you up, moved you here, and covered you with a blanket.”

  “Yeah…” I mumbled, still not fully awake.

  The barge was crowded.

  Pickaxes. Crates. Tools. Explosives.

  Miners, engineers, assistants.

  A dwarf came up to me.

  “This is only the first shipment,” he said. “My name is Roterm.”

  He held out his hand.

  “Zenhald.”

  “I’m responsible for the second group,” he continued. “Seventy-eight people: sixty dwarves, ten humans, eight elves.”

  He smirked.

  “Not often you see a city where everyone works together.”

  “And what am I supposed to do?” I asked, yawning.

  “The mine can collapse at any moment,” he answered immediately. “One wrong blast—and that’s it.”

  “Got it,” I nodded.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  He studied me more closely.

  “Are you sure you can handle this?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted honestly, covering my mouth with my hand.

  He suddenly smiled.

  “You’re, what—twelve?”

  “Almost.”

  “Your golems are flawless,” he said. “Thanks to you, the fields are already being sown. And thanks to you, we’re floating to the mountain right now.”

  I closed my eyes.

  “Wake me up when we’re ready.”

  And I fell asleep again.

  “Zenhald.”

  I opened my eyes.

  “Time to get up,” Noxus said.

  We were already at the mountain.

  A few temporary shacks stood nearby.

  “The first group is under Liara’s command,” Roterm said. “The second is under yours.”

  Your task: explore another cave, establish a base, and begin extraction.”

  I spotted Liara. She smiled and nodded.

  “Good luck.”

  “You too.”

  Work started immediately.

  The dwarves went first, tapping the walls.

  “Hear that?” one of them said to the humans and elves. “The sound is bright—there’s an echo. That means a weak spot. This needs reinforcement.”

  Another pointed at a vein.

  “See the ore? You can’t just tear it out. It’s holding up the ceiling.”

  They moved slowly, carefully.

  After an hour—about fifty meters in—our second group set up its first outpost.

  Crates. Supplies. Tools.

  One dwarf produced a vial.

  “This is a gas indicator,” he explained. “White—fine. Yellow—you can work, but carefully. Red—we leave. Dark…” His face tightened. “God forbid.”

  Extraction began.

  Rails. Mine carts.

  The ring of pickaxes. The thump of dynamite.

  Six hours later, the first load was moving.

  Every twenty minutes—a new cart. Stone. Ore.

  And then—

  KABOOM.

  Rock rained down.

  I lunged forward.

  Someone was pinned.

  I touched the stone— it crumbled into sand. Under it was a human, around forty.

  I started healing immediately.

  He stood up, stunned.

  “Thank you…” he breathed.

  People gathered around.

  Roterm came over.

  “Everyone—out!” he ordered.

  We left the mine.

  He turned to the group.

  “The mine doesn’t forgive mistakes,” he said harshly. “Never rush. Check seven times—then act.”

  He looked at me.

  “You got lucky today. If Zenhald hadn’t been here, one miner would have died.”

  He straightened.

  “And now the good news. By our calculations—ninety tons a day. Stone and ore. There’s a lot of ore here.”

  “Tomorrow the builders will set up a crane to load the barges.”

  The groups started filing out.

  Four had worked today.

  We returned to the barge.

  Roterm came up to me.

  “Thank you.”

  Then Liara approached.

  “How are you?”

  “Fine,” I said. “Someone almost died today.”

  She nodded.

  “Same for us. One elf almost got ten people killed.”

  I sighed.

  “I’m going to sleep.”

  “You slept all day already,” she noted.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I just want to sleep.”

  I blinked—

  and I was back in my shack.

  I didn’t even feel surprised.

  I just lay down

  and kept sleeping.