“Ollie… I have a secret.”

In the dimly illuminated storage room, Peridot was gently caressing Oliver’s dirty left cheek. Well, the two of them were both covered in all kinds of dirt, blood and dust. Their bodies were bruised, battered, but in particular, Oliver looked like he was already dead… But his chest was still rising and falling faintly.

“That bitch Verna… She’s probably the only one that knows. But… *Sniffle* Ollie… I’m sorry. I’m a Thief.”

The dying man didn’t show much of a reaction. She wasn’t sure if he was even conscious or not in the first place.

“My Dad… He was a Thief. Leader of the… Hah~! The ‘Verde Gang’… It’s so stupid… My Uncle is a Thief too… A shitty Thief that never made it past the first Rank. I’m different though… I… I might not be as talented as you and Jade, but look.”

Peridot pulled up her dirty black shorts and revealed the ‘Word’ written on her left inner thigh, ‘Thief V’. She smiled wryly and complained, “It’s not my fault… Being a Thief is a lot harder than being a Miner. You gotta keep secrets all the time, sneak around, steal shit… I don’t even wanna steal, so how the hell can I become some amazing Legendary Thief?”

She reached out and touched the words on his chest, “But… I guess you and Jade had a lot of troubles too… Especially you, Ollie. I wish I could’ve been there with you. I should’ve… I wish I was a Miner. I wish I would’ve just gotten rid of this damn Thief Word! I could’ve done it! Only a thousand gold and I could’ve been a Miner! I could’ve stayed with you, all day, every day, just like Jade… Maybe I could have become a Uranium Miner too? I could’ve actually helped you, instead of wasting so much time alone… I always thought… I thought we had more time, ya know? *Sniffle* Shit…”

Peridot coughed a few times and started crying again, “Ollie… I’m so scared. I know what I have to do, but I’m still such a selfish piece of shit… I just wanna be with you forever. I wanna be your wife. Raise some annoying kids together. Die together. Stay with you forever in this shitty evil mountain with the rest of our stupid friends and family.”

As the VI on his chest turned into a V, she smiled wryly and placed both hands on his chest, “I guess… It’s time to say goodbye, Ollie. I love you so much… Jade is so lucky… I hope you two remember me. I’ll… *Sniffle* Damn it, I’ll haunt you bastards forever!”

The Word ‘Miner’ on Oliver’s chest started fading rapidly, reappearing on Peridot’s left thigh! Those teary green eyes looked down at the ‘Miner Thief VI’ and then she felt her hands burning, so she moved away subconsciously. The temperature started visibly rising in the small storage room, even with the door open.

“Ollie… Can you hear me? Wake up! Please! Ollie!”

Starting from his chest, Oliver’s skin started turning silvery-gray. His long white hair started glowing bright green, even with the lights on the ceiling still shining on his body. The temperature was rising rapidly.

“Shit… Shit… No, Ollie! Please, wake up! I’m not ready!”

Peridot started vomiting blood and bleeding out of her eyes, ears, nose, basically every orifice. Her skin was blistering rapidly, but then her hair actually caught on fire and her blood started evaporating from the heat! The stone underneath her feet was already melting, not to mention her superhuman body… Instead of trying to run away or escape, she hugged his glowing orange body.

With her last breath she screamed, “Oliver! You bastard! I love you!”

Then her flesh and blood were all completely incinerated. Even her bones were blackened rapidly and didn’t take very long to become brittle enough to crumble onto his almost molten chest.

As time passed, his body started to cool down slowly. All those injuries from earlier were recovered and he started breathing again. Exhaling scorching hot air and inhaling a lot of dust in the storage room. The light on the ceiling already disappeared, along with a lot of the wiring. His skin turned from orange to reddish, finally settling on a dull silvery-gray.

“I’m… Alive?” Oliver breathed in deeply and then struggled to sit upright. His body was incredibly stiff and literally made of metal. However, under his control, the skin became more flexible and ‘lifelike’, while the muscle movements were also smoother.

“This… Wasn’t what I wanted…” His glowing green crystalline eyes started leaking silvery mercury-like liquid metal, “I’m sorry…”

He looked down at his left inner thigh but saw nothing, well, he saw ‘something’ but he wasn’t in the mood to think about that right now. Instead, he focused on controlling his strange new body. All he could think about was making himself ‘cooler’, but didn’t really understand how.

“Ollie!” A desperate cry came from outside the open storage room door. The room out there was much brighter with visible light, but the extra ‘green’ light was a lot lower. In fact, when Oliver focused only on that special light, he was practically blind. So he tried to ignore it completely.

“Ollie! Can you hear me?!”

“I… Yeah, I can hear you, Jade!” Oliver cleared his throat and shouted in a relatively deep voice, which had a strange metallic reverb to it now. Then he stood up unsteadily and walked out into the wide-open space. He looked down at the black soot on his chest and wiped it off. Then a t-shirt, boxers and even jeans were conjured up, made out of very thin silvery-gray metal. It took a bit of effort, but the clothes were quickly covered by green crystals that matched his eyes. At least the material didn’t simply blend into his new ‘flesh’ color.

“You need some help?”

“No… I’m fine… Give me a moment.” As Jade spoke, the huge stones melted down and swirled around, then they returned to the ceiling, floors, even the broken pillars were easily repaired. Those severed molten arms and legs had long since cooled, but new ones had already grown back… She reached out and those extra limbs liquified, then recombined with her body. Causing the 2 meter tall girl to grow another 10 centimeters, before shrinking back down to 2 meters again.

“Oliver… You… You finally did it? Wait… Ollie, where’s Peri?”

“I’m… I’m sorry, Jade. Peri, she…” Oliver started tearing up again and Jade was already crying her eyes out, “I’m sorry…”

“Peri… *Sniffle* No! Where is she?! Maybe we can… Maybe we can go back to Klein and he’ll save her?!”

“There’s… There’s nothing left to save, Jade.” Oliver covered his eyes with his right hand and grinded his teeth, “Damn it! I don’t accept this bullshit! This ain’t how it was supposed to be!”

“It’s all their fault!” Jade clenched her glowing orange fists and the whole ground shook violently, “Ollie! We can’t let them get away with this! They have to pay!”

“Who? Who do we even get revenge on?!” Oliver put down his hand and his eyes glowed even brighter, “Kresvallia?! No, wait, I just remembered! Granny Woods! That bitch! That freaking Spy! She’s the one that caused this shit!”

The stone-girl asked, “Do you think she’s still in the village?!”

“The village! Shit! How did I forget?! That piece of shit said that he was gonna kill everyone!”

“Wait… Ollie! Wait! Can we even… Can we even go back to the village now?!” Jade grabbed Oliver’s thick metal arm and held him back, “We’re so bright! Normal people will die if we even get close to them!”