Sound travels four times faster in water than in air. In a semi-solid suspension of ice and chemical coolant, it travels with the force of a physical hammer.
Julian didn't just vibrate the slush; he screamed into it with his very soul.
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.
The pitch was ultrasonic—far beyond human hearing—but the effects were visible. The surface of the freezing sludge in the pit rippled into a complex geometric pattern of standing waves.
Then, the physics of the mixture failed.
The chemical bonds holding the slush together shattered under the intense resonant stress. The trapped potential energy released all at once.
BOOM.
The slush pit didn't melt; it detonated.
A massive geyser of pulverized ice and white chemical fog erupted from the grate, blasting upward with the force of a cannon.
Warden Vakgar, standing at the edge, was thrown backward. He skid across the polished floor, his metal boots carving deep grooves into the marble.
"Impossible," Vakgar hissed, recovering his balance instantly.
From the cloud of freezing mist, Julian pulled himself up over the edge of the pit. He was covered in white rime, his teeth chattering uncontrollably, but his eyes burned with a furious blue fire.
He reached down and hauled Lyra up. She was gasping, her lips purple. Skid followed, looking more dead than alive, her goggles frosted over.
"Move," Julian commanded, his voice shaking. "Get... warm."
He pointed to the vents behind the Warden's desk—the heat exhaust from the computers.
"What about you?" Lyra chattered, trying to rack the slide of her frozen pistol. It was jammed solid.
"I'm... going to break... the ice maker," Julian said, turning to face Vakgar.
Vakgar stood up to his full height. He looked at Julian with genuine curiosity, his translucent skin glowing with the blue pulse of his coolant-blood.
"You vibrated the molecules," Vakgar deduced. "You turned the medium against itself. Clever. But thermal dynamics always win, boy. Entropy is the end of all things."
Vakgar raised his hands. The nozzles implanted in his palms hissed.
FWWOOOOSH.
Twin streams of liquid nitrogen sprayed across the room.
Julian dove to the right. The nitrogen hit the wall where he had been standing. The steel panel froze instantly, then cracked with a loud ping.
"You can't dodge forever!" Vakgar walked forward, spraying death in sweeping arcs. "The room is getting colder. You are slowing down. I am getting faster."
It was true. Julian's limbs felt like lead. The cold was seeping into his joints, stiffening his muscles. His Black-Iron ring felt like a circle of dry ice burning his finger.
He's right, Julian thought, hiding behind a pillar as a jet of nitrogen turned the air next to him into snow. I'm biological. I'm mostly water. I freeze.
But he isn't water.
Julian peered around the pillar. He looked at Vakgar.
The Warden wasn't wearing armor. He didn't need it. His body was a masterpiece of cryogenic engineering. His veins were reinforced quartz tubing. His bones were titanium alloy. His skin was a polymer weave.
He was hard. He was rigid.
And rigid things don't bend.
"Vakgar!" Julian shouted, stepping out from cover.
The Warden stopped, aiming his nozzles. "Final words?"
"You said ice is perfect," Julian said, holding up his crystal hand. It was vibrating. Not with heat, but with a low, dissonant hum. "But perfection has a flaw."
"And what is that?"
"It's brittle."
Julian didn't fire a blast of energy. He didn't try to overpower the Warden.
He snapped his fingers.
PING.
He sent a single, precise note through the air. A frequency specifically tuned to the resonant pitch of Quartz.
Vakgar froze. A look of confusion crossed his featureless face.
A tiny crack appeared on his forearm.
"What?" Vakgar stared at his arm. The blue coolant began to weep out.
"You replaced your veins with glass," Julian walked forward, snapping his fingers again. PING. "Bad engineering."
"Stop!" Vakgar stumbled back. The vibration was spreading. He could feel it inside his chest. His own circulatory system was starting to sing.
PING. PING. PING.
Julian picked up the pace. He clapped his hands rhythmically. Each clap was a hammer blow to the Warden's internal structure.
"The colder you are," Julian said, his voice gaining strength, "the tighter your molecules are packed. The easier they are to shatter."
Vakgar tried to fire his nozzles, but his hands shook uncontrollably. The glass tubing inside his palms shattered.
CRACK.
Liquid nitrogen backfired into his own arms.
"NO!" Vakgar screamed. But it wasn't a scream of pain; it was the sound of tearing metal.
His left arm fell off. It hit the floor and shattered into a thousand glittering pieces like a dropped chandelier.
Vakgar looked at the stump. There was no blood. Just shattered glass and leaking blue fluid.
"I... am... perfect..." Vakgar wheezed, falling to his knees. Cracks were racing up his neck, across his translucent face.
"You're a statue," Julian said, standing over him.
He placed his crystal palm gently on Vakgar's forehead.
"And statues break."
Julian sent one final, massive pulse of Dissonance.
SHATTER.
Warden Vakgar didn't die. He exploded.
His body disintegrated into a shower of diamond-dust and scrap metal. The pressure of his internal coolant system blew his remains across the room, coating the walls in a layer of glittering frost.
Silence returned to the Cold Room.
Julian stood amidst the debris, breathing hard. The threat was gone.
"Remind me," Skid's voice came from the corner, weak but awestruck. "Never to let you clap at my birthday party."
Julian rushed over to them. Lyra and Skid were huddled by the computer vents, shivering but alive.
"He's dust," Julian said, helping them up. "We need to move. The explosion... it probably alerted the Legion."
"No," Lyra pointed to the massive window.
Outside, on the ice below, the battle had changed.
The red lights of the Legion were retreating. The chaos of the prison riot had spilled out onto the snow. Isolde and her raiders were leading thousands of prisoners toward the White Raven.
"The guards are fleeing," Lyra said. "They know the Warden is dead. The command structure collapsed."
"Then we have a clear shot," Julian turned to the back of the room.
There, behind the Warden's shattered desk, was a heavy blast door marked: TITAN ACCESS - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.
"That leads to the spinal column," Julian said. "Straight down to the brain."
He walked to the door. He looked back at the pile of glass that used to be Vakgar.
Then he saw it.
Lying in the frost, untouched by the battle, was the Void Walker Mask.
Julian hesitated. He should crush it. He should destroy the beacon.
But something stopped him. A feeling.
The Seven Titans. The Seven Locks.
If I wake them... the Empire falls. But what rises in its place?
He picked up the mask. It was cold, smooth, and heavy.
"Julian?" Lyra asked, watching him.
"We might need it," Julian said quietly, tucking the mask into his coat. "To listen to the enemy."
He turned to the blast door. He placed his hand on the lock.
Open.
The door hissed and slid aside, revealing a dark elevator shaft leading down into the heart of the world.
"Let's go wake up a god," Julian said.