Chapter 191: Cracking Her Barrier Was the Easy Part

Raven waited until his arm was responding again before disassembling the Mk.I. His fingers still carried an unpleasant stiffness, and whenever he tried to close his hand too tightly, pain climbed from his palm to his elbow.

But he could work.

That was enough.

They had found an abandoned structure several kilometers from Bellcross, probably an old storage post merchants had used before the main road shifted elsewhere. Three walls remained intact, half the roof still existed, and there was a table sturdy enough not to collapse when Raven placed equipment on it.

Roland had called the place luxurious.

Valeria had informed him that his standards were concerning.

Raven had only checked how many entrances it had.

Now the Mk.I rested in pieces across the table beside recovered projectiles, steel, tools, and a quantity of Black Mithril far smaller than Raven would have preferred.

Valeria sat on an overturned crate while Roland occupied the entrance with a cup he had somehow acquired.

Raven studied the projectile he had fired at Elise. The tip had deformed badly, but the round remained recognizable.

FORGE had recorded the impact.

That interested him considerably more than the fact that he had cracked a Champion’s barrier.

Valeria had been watching him for several minutes.

"You’re going to say it, aren’t you?"

Raven looked up.

"Say what?"

"That it wasn’t good enough."

"It didn’t penetrate."

Valeria let her head fall backward.

"I knew you were going to say that."

Roland lifted his cup.

"I was also expecting slightly more celebration."

"Raven, you’re Level Fifteen," Valeria said. "She’s a Champion, and you cracked her barrier."

"A barrier she raised on reflex because she thought it would be enough."

Raven put the projectile down.

"Now she knows it isn’t."

That quieted her.

Roland took a drink.

"Well. That ruined the celebration efficiently."

"Next time she sees the Mk.I, she won’t use the same defense."

"Maybe there won’t be a next time," Roland said.

Raven looked at him.

Roland lasted two seconds.

"Fine. There’ll be a next time."

Valeria sighed.

"You could at least admit it was impressive."

"It was useful."

"That isn’t the same thing."

"For me it is."

"Sometimes I wonder how you survived twenty-eight years while being like this."

"Discipline."

Roland muttered, "I would’ve guessed lack of friends."

Raven ignored him and flexed his injured hand.

"The barrier isn’t the main problem."

Valeria’s expression changed.

"Your arm."

"Elise did this without trying to hurt me."

Roland looked toward the hand.

"That’s still difficult to process."

"It shouldn’t be."

"Everything is easy for you to process once you turn it into a list."

Raven pointed at him with the damaged projectile.

"Level Sixty. Champion. Sacred techniques. Remote restraint. Near-instant response."

"There’s the list."

Valeria almost smiled, but it disappeared when Raven continued.

"Radiant Metabolism reduced the effect, and I still lost most of one arm and one leg."

"So it barely helped."

"It helped enough that I recovered faster."

"That doesn’t mean you can take another one."

"I wasn’t planning to."

Roland laughed.

"That really is new."

Raven picked up a file.

"I’m not training myself to absorb Champion attacks."

"Good. Very reassuring."

Valeria rose and approached the table.

"My magic wouldn’t have changed much either."

Raven glanced at her.

"You’re Level Twenty-Nine."

"And still very far below her."

She placed both hands on the table.

"There’s a difference between knowing someone is a Champion and standing in front of one. I can handle most Awakened without worrying much. Against other Elites, I still have room to improvise. With Elise, I had to think before shaping every technique."

Roland raised a finger.

"I appreciate being included in this comparison before becoming irrelevant."

Valeria ignored him.

"If she had focused on dismantling my magic instead of brushing it aside, she probably could have. If she concentrated on me first, neither of you would matter until she finished."

Raven set the file down.

"I know."

"No. You know the numbers."

She pointed toward the Mk.I.

"What I’m telling you is that I don’t balance the difference."

"I never assumed you did."

That stopped her.

"Then what are you doing?"

Raven looked down at the damaged projectile.

"Stopping trying to solve the barrier with more power."

Valeria frowned.

"You’re giving up on penetration?"

"No. I’m giving up on assuming penetration only means hitting harder."

He tapped the flattened tip.

"If I increase the charge, I increase heat, pressure, and structural wear. If the rifle survives and the shot gets through, Elise simply uses a stronger defense next time. Keep repeating that and eventually I’m competing directly against a Champion’s mana reserves."

Roland glanced at the rifle.

"A contest you lose."

"Yes."

The Mk.I had proven that Elise’s barrier could be affected.

It had not shown Raven why.

The defense might have absorbed the impact directly, redistributed it, reinforced the contact point, or done something else entirely. Until he understood that interaction, adding more power only made each mistake more expensive.

Valeria looked at the damaged round.

"So you’re still trying to penetrate it. You just want to understand why the first one stopped."

"Exactly."

"That sounds almost reasonable."

Roland lifted his cup.

"Disturbing."

Raven placed three unfinished rounds on the table.

"One is heavier. One concentrates force over a smaller area. One fragments after impact."

Roland stared at the last one.

"That escalated quickly."

"They test different failures."

Valeria picked up the heavier projectile.

"You want to see whether the round is collapsing before the barrier does."

"Among other things."

FORGE could identify structural weaknesses and evaluate compatibility, but it couldn’t give Raven expertise he had never acquired.

He still had to experiment.

Mass.

Shape.

Material.

Impulse.

What survived impact and what didn’t.

That was enough for now.

Valeria set the round down.

"So first you improve the projectile. Then you increase the charge."

"When I know the extra energy won’t just destroy the ammunition."

Roland looked at the Mk.I.

"I’m glad we finally acknowledged the rifle can explode."

"It was always acknowledged."

"That makes it worse."

Raven reached for the small pile of Black Mithril.

"There isn’t enough for complete rounds, so I’ll use partial internal reinforcement."

Valeria picked up one of the dark fragments.

"To keep the projectile intact longer."

"Yes."

"Against Elise?"

"Eventually. First against something cheaper."

Roland nodded solemnly.

"I strongly support shooting walls before Champions."

Raven placed the fragment beside the unfinished rounds.

Steel would not reproduce a sacred barrier, but it could tell him whether the projectile itself failed before the defense became the relevant variable.

That was enough for the first stage.

Valeria looked over the table.

"So tomorrow you test the designs, keep the ones that survive, then start asking what the barrier itself is doing."

"Yes."

Roland sighed.

"And somewhere in there we discover Black Mithril is too expensive."

"Probably."

"I hate being right."

"Only when it costs you money," Valeria said.

"It usually does."

Raven picked up the file again.

Valeria stayed beside the table.

"Ammunition still isn’t the whole problem."

"No."

"She can move, attack before you finish aiming, and she knows the rifle is dangerous now. If she stops holding back, you might not get another clean shot."

Raven paused.

That was the larger problem.

The damaged projectile could teach him how the Mk.I interacted with one barrier. It could not teach him how to survive long enough to fire at a prepared Champion.

He glanced at his still-stiff hand.

"That comes after the ammunition."

Roland frowned.

"I dislike the way you say things like that."

"For good reason."

Valeria leaned against the table.

"So the rifle is only one part."

"Yes."

Raven didn’t yet know the rest.

He knew Elise had refused to use greater force near Bellcross even when that allowed them to escape. He knew she had reacted to the Mk.I with surprise. He knew restraint mattered to her.

Useful observations.

Not yet a strategy.

First the weapon.

Then the barrier.

Then Elise.

Raven resumed filing the projectile.

"First we make sure the bullet survives."

Valeria smiled faintly.

"And after that?"

Raven looked at the damaged round from Bellcross.

"We find out what actually stopped it."