He didn't remember how he got back to the city.
Only flashes remained—being half-carried by the woman, the child's terrified eyes, the injured man limping beside them. The gates opening, hands pulling him onto a stretcher. Then nothing but darkness.
When he woke, three days had passed. Bandages wrapped his torso; his ribs were bound tight. The gauntlet lay shattered on the table beside his bed, a broken husk of steel and crystal veins.
The survivors were gone, safe. They had left only a note of thanks, unsigned.
For two more days, he rested. His body mended slowly, but his mind kept returning to the gauntlet's fragments. He couldn't explain why, but looking at it made something ache deep inside—a craftsman's instinct, a memory buried under the fog.
On the fifth day, he limped through the city until he found it: an abandoned blacksmith shop, its forge cold and forgotten. Dust covered the anvil, rust clung to the tools, but as he stepped inside, his hands trembled—not with weakness, but recognition.
He set the gauntlet's pieces on the anvil.
Then he began to work.
At first his movements were clumsy. His broken ribs ached, his body screamed. But his hands remembered what his mind did not. The rhythm of hammer and tongs, the shaping of metal, the weaving of mana into steel—it all returned in fragments. Sparks flew, filling the air with the smell of iron and fire.
Hours passed. Sweat soaked his clothes, blood dripped from reopened wounds, but he did not stop. The forge roared hotter, brighter, as though it too remembered.
At last, the fragments began to fuse. Not into one gauntlet—but into two.
Twin bracers of dark steel and glowing veins, their cores thrumming with renewed life. The moment the final strike fell, mana surged. The forge blazed with light.
The new gauntlets pulsed. Then—
"We're back," said the old voice, steady, calm.
"And better than ever!" chirped a new one, bright and teasing. "Boss, you really hammered me into shape! Literally!"
He froze, staring at them as both slid onto his arms, fitting perfectly. Heat flooded through his veins—smoother, stronger, alive.
"You… evolved."
"More than that," the calm voice said. "Our synchronization has deepened. We are whole."
"And way cooler than before," the cheeky voice added. "Seriously, dual-wield gauntlets? Now you can punch AND shoot at the same time. Admit it, boss. We're awesome."
For the first time in days, he laughed—a raw, hoarse sound. The ache in his chest lightened.
The forge dimmed. The night was still. But in his hands rested more than weapons. They were partners now, with voices, with spirit.
And for the first time since he woke with no memory, he felt he wasn't walking alone.