The dark alleyway in Valerius had grown unnaturally cold. The damp cobblestones beneath their feet were rapidly freezing over, covered in a thin layer of sharp frost.
The Grand Magus of the Ivory Tower stood tall, his glowing blue eyes locked onto Stephanie. The sheer volume of mana rolling off his ancient ivory staff was suffocating. To an ordinary person, this pressure would have forced them to their knees in absolute reverence.
But the three people standing before him were far from ordinary.
"You dare mass-produce the sacred arts?" the Magus sneered, his voice echoing like cracking ice. "You trap the divine essence of mana inside crude iron machines to make soap and glass. You have insulted the very fabric of magic, false Queen. The Ivory Tower sentences you to an absolute, frozen death."
