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The howling of the wind increased with each step she took, as if the Golem Fields themselves were warning her away.The ground beneath her feet was treacherous—patches of ice hidden beneath innocent-looking snow, shards of metal jutting up at unpredictable intervals.Thalia moved carefully, testing each footfall before committing her weight.

The sounds of the other students — the distant shuffling of feet, the occasional cough or murmured curse — faded behind her until all she could hear was the wind and the occasional groan of shifting ice.The isolation was immediate and absolute.

A distant crack echoed across the fields — the sound of ice breaking, or perhaps a golem awakening.Thalia instinctively dropped into a crouch, scanning the horizon.Nothing moved except swirling snow, but the sound had been a stark reminder of what lurked in this place.

After several tense moments, she continued forward, angling slightly west.The academy lay due north, but Thalia had no intention of taking a direct path through the heart of the Golem Fields.Better to skirt the edges where she could, even if it meant a longer journey.

She pressed her palm against the ground, closing her eyes to better focus on the sensation that had become increasingly familiar over her months at Frostforge.The metal veins beneath the earth's surface hummed with a distinct resonance, each type of ore singing its own quiet song.Iron was a deep, steady pulse.Copper trilled higher, more excitable.And there — a faint but recognizable pattern that she'd come to associate with tungsten.

Thalia opened her eyes, a ghost of a smile touching her lips.She had sensed this particular tungsten vein during training exercises on the Crystalline Plateau.If she followed it, she would at least know she was moving in territory that had been deemed safe enough for supervised training.

As she tracked the vein, memories of Kaine's patient instruction filtered through her mind.His deep voice explaining how different metals responded to different forging techniques.His calloused hands guiding hers as she learned to sense the subtle variations in ore quality.The almost-smile that would touch his lips when she succeeded.

"Feel the metal's voice," he had told her during one late-night session in the forge."It's not just dead earth.It has history, memory, temperament."

At the time, she had thought he was being poetic.Now, with her life depending on her ability to navigate by the songs of buried metal, she understood the practicality behind his words.

The tungsten vein led her around a particularly treacherous field of ice spikes, their transparent surfaces glinting like serrated teeth.She moved steadily, conserving energy, her eyes constantly scanning for movement.Twice she froze in place as distant shapes shifted against the white backdrop, but neither proved to be golems — just snow collapsing from overhanging ice shelves.

The wind shifted direction, now driving directly into her face with increased savagery.Ice crystals stung her exposed skin, and she tugged her scarf higher until only her eyes remained uncovered.The sky darkened further as the storm intensified, visibility dropping by the minute.

Thalia tightened the straps on her pack, verifying that her supplies were secure.The weight of her forged ice-steel blade against her hip was reassuring.She had poured all her skill into crafting it, and though it wasn't a masterwork, it would serve its purpose if she encountered trouble.

The tungsten vein began to diverge from her planned route, veering eastward toward what she knew to be a more dangerous section of the Fields.Thalia hesitated, weighing her options.Following familiar metal signatures felt safer, but would lead her into territory known to harbor active golems.

She closed her eyes again, pressing both hands to the frozen ground, searching for a different signature.There — fainter but recognizable — a vein of silver that seemed to run more northerly.Thalia adjusted her course, following the silver vein northward.

The terrain grew more challenging with each passing hour.What had begun as a relatively flat expanse gave way to sudden drops and rising shelves of ice.The silver vein led her up a gradual incline, the footing becoming increasingly precarious as loose shards of ice skittered away beneath her boots.

At the crest of the rise, Thalia paused to catch her breath.From this vantage point, she could see further across the Golem Fields, though the worsening storm obscured the most distant features.Movement caught her eye, a dark shape lumbering between ice formations perhaps half a mile east.Its movements were too mechanical to be anything but a golem.

Thalia dropped to her knees, making herself as small as possible against the white landscape.The golem showed no sign of having spotted her, continuing its ponderous patrol.She watched it until it disappeared behind a massive ice shelf, then rose carefully to her feet.

The wind howled with renewed fury, driving snow horizontally across her path.Thalia lowered her head and pressed forward, following the increasingly faint song of the silver beneath her feet.The cold had penetrated all layers of her clothing now, settling into her bones with a dull ache that threatened to slow her movements.

"Keep moving," she muttered to herself, the words immediately torn away by the wind."Just keep moving."

The vibration came first — a subtle tremor in the ground that traveled up through Thalia's boots and into her bones.She stopped mid-stride, every muscle suddenly alert.The air pressure changed, growing heavier, as if the atmosphere itself was being compressed by something massive moving through it.Thalia slowly turned toward the disturbance, her hand instinctively finding the hilt of her ice-steel shortsword.Through a curtain of swirling snow, a dark shape materialized; it was a golem, its movements deliberate and inexorable as it headed directly toward her position.

Her heart hammered against her ribs, each beat sending a fresh surge of adrenaline through her veins.The golem was still far enough away that it might not have detected her, but its path would intersect with hers within minutes.She crouched lower, making herself smaller against the white backdrop, and forced herself to study the construct methodically, the way Kaine had taught her to analyze metal formations.

The golem's body was primarily ice-iron, a nightmarish fusion of metal and frozen water that only occurred in places of extreme magical convergence.Its core glowed with a dull blue light that pulsed like a heartbeat, while its limbs — asymmetrical and cruelly jointed — dragged through the snow with inexorable purpose.Where the metal components met the ice, frost had formed intricate patterns reminiscent of the ancient sigils she and Kaine had discovered behind the unused furnace.The golem's head was a featureless block of solid ice with shards of rusted metal protruding at odd angles, giving it the appearance of wearing a crown of broken swords.

As it drew closer, Thalia could hear the grinding of metal against ice with each movement, a sound like the death rattle of some mechanical beast.Flakes of rust drifted down in its wake, leaving a faint trail of reddish specks on the pristine snow.

Thalia tightened her grip on her sword hilt but didn't draw the weapon.Her blade, while decently crafted, would likely do little against the golem's massive frame.Even if she could damage it, the combat would be noisy and possibly lengthy — attracting attention from other constructs, or else rimwolves, the predators that stalked the mountains hunting for weakened prey.

She considered her position, scanning the surrounding terrain for advantages.To her right, a ridge of ice offered a potential path, but the footing looked treacherous, with patches of near-transparent ice that would make silent movement impossible.To her left, a field of snow-covered boulders might provide cover, but the spacing between them would force her to expose herself repeatedly as she moved from one to the next.

The direct path ahead lay open, with only scattered ice formations interrupting the flat expanse.The golem was approaching from an angle that would cut off this route within minutes.

"Think," she whispered to herself, the word forming a small cloud in the frigid air.

The golem paused suddenly, its head swiveling in a half-circle as it scanned its surroundings.Thalia held her breath, remaining still.Had it sensed her?The construct's detecting mechanisms were poorly understood even by Frostforge's instructors.Some claimed they tracked heat signatures; others insisted they responded to movement; still others believed they could sense the magical potential in human blood.

After what felt like an eternity, the golem resumed its march, still on an intercept course with her position but showing no signs of having detected her presence yet.

Thalia exhaled slowly, then closed her eyes to center herself.She had to move, and quickly, but panic would only lead to mistakes.Who among her peers had faced similar situations and prevailed?Whose techniques could she adapt?