The iron pickaxe felt less like a tool and more like a fossil in Evelyn's blistered hands. She ran her thumb over the blunt, chipped edge. If Kaelen struck the solid wall of quartzite hiding the silver, the brittle iron would snap on the first swing. And Varo would toss them in the pit before the dust settled.
She closed her eyes, letting the amber grid of the Steward's Oversight wash over her vision.
[ STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS: QUARTZITE BARRIER ]
Hardness: 7 (Mohs Scale).
Composition: Silicon dioxide. Dense crystalline structure.
Steward's Note: "The earth is unyielding to brute force, but submissive to the laws of its design. Seek the elements' balance."
"We can't dig through this," Evelyn murmured, her voice scratching her parched throat. She dropped the heavy pickaxe. It clattered against the stone floor, echoing in the tight cavern.
Kaelen flinched at the noise, his amber eyes darting toward the tunnel entrance. "Evie, what are you doing? If we don't dig..."
"If we dig, the tool breaks," she interrupted, her eyes darting around their small prison. "I need the tallow candles. All of them. And the water."
Kaelen stared at her, his chest heaving with a suppressed cough. "That's our drinking water. It's contaminated, you said it yourself, but it's all we have. And without the candles, we're in the pitch black."
"If we don't do this, we won't need water tomorrow," she said softly, stepping closer. She placed a hand on his forearm. His skin was burning with fever. "Trust me. I see a way through."
He studied her face in the flickering light. He had known her for years before they woke up in chains, and he knew that look. It was the same look she had right before solving a structural collapse on the Seattle viaduct. With a heavy sigh, he reached into his ragged tunic and handed over their remaining, half-melted tallow candles and the dented tin cup.
Evelyn knelt at the base of the rock wall, directly beneath where the System indicated the hidden silver lay. She broke the candles into chunks, piling them against the stone, and added dried moss and splintered wood handles from broken tools left in the debris.
"Flint," she commanded, holding out her hand.
Kaelen struck a spark. A small, smoky fire hissed to life.
As the flames licked the stone, Evelyn's vision bloomed with data.
[ THERMODYNAMIC MONITORING ]
Surface Temperature: 45°C... 80°C... climbing.
Target Threshold for Fracture: 400°C.
"Fan it," Evelyn said, her eyes locked on the invisible numbers hovering in the air. "We need it hotter. The heat will force the crystalline structure of the rock to expand."
Kaelen ripped a piece of stiff leather from his tattered boot and began fanning the flames. Smoke filled the cramped space, thick and suffocating. Evelyn watched the temperature readout climb. 150°C. 220°C. She was completely absorbed in the math. It was elegant. It was a perfect, unbroken law of thermodynamics, a quiet testament to a universe designed with order.
310°C. 380°C.
"Keep fanning," she ordered, not looking away from the rock. "Almost there. Just a little more oxygen..."
A heavy thud broke her concentration. She blinked, the system interface fading slightly. Kaelen was on his hands and knees, gasping for air, the leather fan discarded in the dirt. The smoke and the exertion had overwhelmed his fever-weakened lungs.
Evelyn's breath hitched. A cold spike of guilt pierced her chest. The Architect's Blindness. She had been looking at the numbers, treating him like a mechanical bellow, completely ignoring the fragile, human limits of her best friend.
"Kaelen!" She dropped to her knees beside him, pulling him away from the smoke. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Breathe."
He coughed violently, leaning against her shoulder. "Did it... did it work?" he wheezed.
She looked at the wall.
The System flashed a steady, pulsing green.
[ THRESHOLD REACHED: 420°C ]
Evelyn grabbed the tin cup of water. "Cover your face," she warned.
She stood, pulled her arm back, and hurled the lukewarm water directly onto the blistering hot stone.
SSSHHHHH-CRACK.
The sound was like a thunderclap in the confined space. The violent temperature shift, from extreme heat to sudden cold, forced the rapidly expanded rock to contract instantly. The laws of nature, written into the very foundation of the world, did what human muscle could not.
A spiderweb of deep fissures raced up the rock face. With a groan of shifting weight, a massive slab of the quartzite peeled away and crashed to the cavern floor in a cloud of dust and steam.
As the smoke cleared, Kaelen slowly lowered his arm. The dim light of their dying fire caught the freshly exposed wall.
There, glittering with an unmistakable, heavy luster, was a vein of raw silver as thick as a man's thigh.
Evelyn let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding. Thank you, she thought silently, looking up at the cavern ceiling, acknowledging the Creator whose physical laws had just saved their lives.
Heavy, rhythmic footsteps echoed down the tunnel. The morning bell rang in the distance, a dull, mournful toll.
Varo stepped into the clearing, whip in hand, a cruel smirk playing on his lips.
"Sunrise, rats. Time for the pit."
He stopped dead. His eyes darted from the shattered rock on the floor to the massive fortune gleaming in the wall. The smirk melted off his face, replaced by a slack-jawed stare.
Evelyn stood up slowly, wiping the soot from her brow. She looked the Overseer dead in the eye, her voice calm and devoid of fear.
"We found your silver, Varo. Now, bring us our rations. We have work to do."