She’d done it. She was finally here. The place where Eclipse had been forged. 

To anyone else, it would’ve probably been an underwhelming relic of the past. Jinsoul found it beautiful. 

It was quiet, so quiet that each brush of the wind across the grass could be heard. As she walked, her footsteps created a small crunch whenever they sank into the ground. It was peaceful here, practically untouched since the migration out of the village. 

Jinsoul wondered if she was just imagining the sense of magic that permeated the air, or if that was really there. It probably was. She hoped it was. 

The buildings were half in ruin. A select few were standing, but others had crumbled, leaving only a few raised walls and collapsed roofs.

Jinsoul didn’t look in any of the intact houses. Any curses would’ve probably been countered, or set off, while any riches had long since been picked away. There were plenty of people who either hadn’t believed in, or hadn’t cared about, the darkness that surrounded this place. 

Jinsoul believed in it, but she’d also come here. 

She wanted to know where it had all began. She wanted Eclipse to return here as well. 

Her strategy had been to go on instinct as she’d always did. The only difference this time was that she was following a trail several hundred years old. 

“We’ll be here a while.” She drew Eclipse from her scabbard. “You can always light the way if you want.” She looked down at the blade. 

There was, of course, no response. 

Jinsoul kept looking, wondering if she’d see that flash of red again.

The only red she did see was what lined the edge of the blade. 

Someone had cared enough about the blade to put such incredible detail into it. This sword must’ve taken ages to make. Then the spells cast over it had taken even more time. 

How could someone put so much time into something and not have left anything here? She wasn’t looking for another sword, but there had to be something still here. Either something that could tell her more about the blacksmiths, or what exactly had happened here three hundred years ago.  

Jinsoul would find it. 

She kept walking, hoping she’d spot something before she had to start making runes. 

Eclipse started humming when she passed a house that was almost completely broken down. 

Jinsoul froze. The humming didn’t get stronger, but it didn’t fade either. It was both metallic and melodic, but she couldn’t make out the note. 

Carefully, she lifted the sword to her face. She only saw her reflection. 

Then there was a red flash and she saw someone else. It was only brief, but it was a different person. The only thing Jinsoul remembered were the eyes. Red. 

“Are we here?” Jinsoul asked, looking at the sword. 

No response, but the sword was still humming. 

“If this’s cursed,” she muttered, going towards the rubble. 

The humming got stronger, so much so that her hand trembled. Jinsoul was tempted to put Eclipse down, but she didn’t want to risk something happening now. What if Eclipse broke because Jinsoul had been stupid enough enough to drop her? It was durable metal, but she’d never touched stone with the sword. 

Jinsoul sheathed the sword. It kept humming, but it’d be covered if it scraped on any of the stone. 

She poked through the bricks, tossing some away when she felt no magic from them at all. 

Was this really where the smith of the sword had lived? They hadn’t had any enchantments around the house? 

That should’ve been impossible. 

There had to be something underneath. 

She walked across the stones, managing to trip several times and scrape her knees. She stopped at the place where the humming was the strongest. There wasn’t anything out of the ordinary here. 

Jinsoul started shifting the rock within a metre radius. She couldn’t feel any flicker of magic when she touched the stone, but Eclipse kept humming. She was in the right place. She had to be. 

It took the good part of an hour for Jinsoul’s arms to start hurting. She’d only managed to move a segment. Now she was looking at rotted wooden floors. They didn’t smell, but she knew that when it rained, the process would just continue. 

Jinsoul cast a spell against the fumes first, knowing full well that if she started digging, she’d probably get some sort of terrible lung infection or another disease. The potions she had with her definitely didn’t protect her against that. 

She knelt down by the exposed bit of floor. She hadn’t found anything that might’ve once been of value. That’d been long since taken or washed away by the weather. This bit of the ground was also unremarkable, save for frayed bits of wood. 

She started to carve a rune into one of the biggest stones. It was a risky one, but she was almost certain that the rest of the rubble looked the same. And whatever was sending Eclipse into the state it was, she was close to it here. Still, it’d be better once she cleared away everything else. It just had to work. 

She finished the rune before leaping off of the rubble and sprinting away from the building. 

There was small shudder in the ground. It threw Jinsoul off her feet, her head hitting the ground. She groaned, pushing herself back up. The side of her face was bleeding and she was almost certain she had a concussion. 

She looked over at the house, to find that the rubble had been mostly cleared away. She grinned and stumbled over. She fell several times, but she eventually managed to get there. Eclipse started humming again. 

“We’ll make it work,” she muttered. “I’ll find it.” She patted the sword.

Jinsoul stepped over the stone that’d been tossed to the side. In the distance, she saw that a few bricks had hit the trees, breaking off pieces, or just toppling them on impact. 

Oops. She looked away and towards the ground. 

As with what she’d seen before, almost all of it had suffered from the weather. When it’d rained, the water had gotten through the stone and soaked into the floor. It’d stayed there when it got warmer and a lot of things had probably groan there. 

Jinsoul pulled out a cloth and wrapped it around and nose. She sank to her knees and pressed her hands to the ground. It was soft in some places, but there was nothing beneath the dingy floorboards, except for dirt and rock. 

She kept looking, praying she wouldn’t get some horrible infection in her fingers. She should’ve brought gloves, but she’d forgotten about that. 

Now she was trying to pry the floor away with the spare knife she’d brought. She’d barely sharpened this one. Eclipse was always what she used. The knife was just to have something else along with her and she hadn’t taken the new one with her. 

Jinsoul sighed. She’d spent another hour here and found nothing. She was starting to get a headache from the cloth cover. 

Then again, better that than getting a horrible disease by early next week. 

Eventually, she’d taken out all of the floorboards. Some had crumbled in her hands. Others had driven a splinter in that she’d had to take out. She’d have to put a good amount of ointments over them. 

She really wished she’d taken gloves. 

And there was nothing. No trap door. 

“You’re kidding,” Jinsoul muttered. “All this for that?” She drew out the sword again. It was still humming. “Do you wanna be buried here?” 

No, you idiot, the voice was not her own, but it was in her head. 

Jinsoul yelped, stumbling back. She didn’t let go of Eclipse. There wasn’t supposed to be an answer if she asked something. She just did it to fill the silence. 

What do you do when you reach dirt? It sounded like a girl, a girl who was both tired and angry at the same time. 

“Dig?” 

So dig. 

Whatever feeling Jinsoul had gotten from the voice vanished. Eclipse was still humming. 

Jinsoul sheathed the sword and pulled the shovel she’d brought out from her back. She cleared away a bit more wood, before she sank the shovel into the ground. 

Briefly, she wondered if she should’ve been following the words of a voice in her head. 

Then she decided that following it would be better than ignoring it. She’d come so far. And there had to be something that Eclipse was drawn to. 

As far as she knew, the sword wasn’t surrounded by dark magic, so whatever awaited her probably wasn’t either. 

Hopefully. 

She kept digging, before the ground promptly gave way. She fell through to another floor, full of dust and more dirt. 

Jinsoul groaned, before coughing. Was all of this really worth for a sword?

Yes, she thought, pushing herself up. She hadn’t sprained anything, but she’d be covered in bruises by tomorrow. 

Jinsoul summoned a ball of magelight, illuminating the space around her. She gasped, then started to cough immediately after. 

She’d landed in a forge. The forge where their weapons had been made. Where Eclipse had been forged. 

There were three anvils. They’d been shattered. The forge itself had been partially melted, even though it’d been made of stone. 

But it was still very clearly a forge. 

“You were right.” She drew out Eclipse, grinning. “I can’t believe it.” 

Then the sword nearly leapt out of her hand then. She tightened her grip on it. What was happening? Why had Eclipse moved? How had it moved?

The sword pulled away from her again, pulling her to the melted stone forge. 

Jinsoul let herself be dragged over, careful not to trip over the blocks of metal still on the ground. None of it was rusted, even after all these years. 

The sword sank into the stone of the forge. There was no scraping sound. 

And then there was the sound of tearing metal. Jinsoul felt the sword grow almost three times as heavy as it was before. She almost slammed into the forge. The sword glowed a bright gold. 

In the next moment, she was holding the hands of another person. She gawked at what was in front of her. At the person in front of her. 

Her first thought was that she’d come face to face with a terrible trick of a demon. An otherworldly beauty that would proceed to tear her apart. 

Her next thought was that the girl looked too stunned to be an illusion or a trick, 

The third thought was that she was stunning. 

The next thought was that the girl’s skin was silver. 

“Let go,” the girl muttered. “I can’t feel my hand and I’d very much like to.” It was the voice she’d heard in her head. There was still the same exact irritation. 

Jinsoul let go. 

The girl looked at her hand with dread. Nothing happened. 

“What did you do?” she asked, voice filled with awe. Then she patted a hand to her face. Her hair was somewhere between silver and gold. She blinked once. Her eyes were silver, but the bottom of one eye was a streak of red. Like an crescent that had been drawn around the iris. 

“Eclipse?” Jinsoul gaped. 

Her brow furrowed. “Yes, I was your bleeding sword.” She sighed. “Now that we have that out of the way, how’d you get me out?” 

“Well to give you an idea about what just happened for me, my sword vanished and you just appeared.”

“You don’t know?” The girl frowned at her. She spoke perfect Korean, but there was still an accent that Jinsoul couldn’t place. 

“Not yet!” Jinsoul exclaimed. “I’m still processing the fact that my sword’s a human.”

The girl gave her a long look. It didn’t help that she had a glare as sharp as the sword she’d been. “I made it, so your sword is technically my sword.”

“And you’re technically your own sword.”

She sighed. “Not the point. Just don’t call me your sword, Jinsoul.” “You know my name?” Jinsoul knew she sounded dumb. She felt dumb too. This girl had been a sword this entire time, and she seemed more put together than Jinsoul was. 

Then it clicked. She’d been a sword this entire time. This was the blacksmith’s daughter, the one who’d helped create a lot of the weapons. She hadn’t died. She’d been trapped in the sword for hundreds of years. 

“‘Course I know your name,” she rolled her eyes, “it’s not only the same name of one of the first person who actually used me, but I also heard a few things now and again.” 

“Did you see anything?” Jinsoul stared at her. “I slept with you for years. And I kept you on the wall when I wasn’t.” 

The sword-girl’s face had turned a light bronze, but she was still scowling at her. “A sword doesn’t have eyes, you idiot.” 

“Idiot?” she repeated. “A full-grown person being a sword is possible, but a sword being able to see is stupid?” 

“Yes.”

Jinsoul nearly made her turn into a sword again. She wondered if that would work. “So you didn’t see anything.” 

“No.” She raised a silver brow. “And I think I should be very glad I haven’t.” 

Jinsoul’s face warmed immediately then. She looked away, focusing on the forge. Despite being more or less broken, the materials were all in relatively good condition. She hadn’t seen the chimney from above, so that was probably plugged. 

If she cast a few more spells, repaired what she could, replaced what she couldn’t, and cleared away more dirt, they’d probably be able to get the forge working again. She felt a little giddy at the thought. 

“I only experienced anything when I was held,” the girl said. “I felt when I was being swung at something. I knew what I made contact with. And I felt their soul if it was a living thing.”

Jinsoul looked back. 

Eclipse—the girl—was looking down at her hands. She didn’t look sad, but more thoughtful than anything, as if all this was coming to her at once and she was trying to understand it. Maybe she was. 

“Sorry.”

Jungeun looked up and shook her head. “You didn’t know I was there. You thought you were using a normal weapon.” 

“None of the weapons you made were normal,” Jinsoul said. “Normal are the ones of steel and iron.”

“And they’re terrible,” she finished. A small smile formed. 

Jinsoul decided then and there that she liked the sword a lot better when she smiled. 

The sword, she repeated in her head. This is a human being. Trapped in the form of a sword. 

Still with silver skin and a red line under her eye. 

“Not terrible,” Jinsoul shrugged, “but I’m not planning on using them.” 

The smile grew. Jinsoul felt accomplished for getting it there. 

“Your parents probably shouldn’t have given you the blade so early,” she said. “I still remember being thrown to the floor.”

“Dropped,” Jinsoul corrected. “I was seven.” 

“And?” Her brow rose. “I could hold a blade at that age. Perhaps I couldn’t swing it, but I could definitely hold it.” 

“Maybe you were stronger than I was then,” Jinsoul gave her a look. “You probably grew up trying to lift slabs of metal.” 

The girl shrugged. “Manual labour was a great way to build my strength.” Her eyes flicked across Jinsoul’s form. “Though I think you’ve gotten better since then?” She raised a brow, meeting Jinsoul’s eyes again. 

Immediately, she felt a bit shy. “I’d hope so. You know, years later, after actual training?” 

She nodded once, before looking at the forge. Her face fell. 

“The bastards ruined it,” she muttered. “But they didn’t take everything.” She frowned, kneeling down beside a slab of metal. She put a hand on it. Her skin matched the metal perfectly. “The magic’s still there?” She sounded in awe. 

“What magic?” Jinsoul asked, going to her side. Somehow, it didn’t feel weird being around her. Thinking about what was actually happening was weird, because Jinsoul hadn’t expected to be around her sword–turned–human, but she didn’t feel terrified being around her. 

Was that because she was so used to having Eclipse at her side normally?

“My father,” her voice caught then, “he cast anti-corrosion spells on all of this. Including something specific for stone.” She smiled slightly, but it was shaky. “I think it all lasted longer than he did.” She blinked several times. 

Jinsoul’s heart sank. This girl’s life had been hundreds of years ago. It probably didn’t feel like a lot of time had passed, but it was all gone. Her entire village had probably kept living on with their lives, while she’d been a sword. 

She didn’t know if she was making a mistake with this or not. Jinsoul gently took her hand. 

The girl didn’t pull away immediately. She closed her eyes and tears fell. It had a golden sheen, but was still transparent. 

“Do you know if they let him live?” she asked. “The rest of the village too?” 

“I never read about anything happening here, except for your work and then your disappearance,” Jinsoul said. “And it was only you.” Her father had stopped making weapons completely after that, but she wouldn’t tell her that now. 

The girl grimaced, but she looked relieved. “Good. That means they probably just kept me as blackmail. Or they lost me.” She peeked up at her. “Or your ancestors stole me.” 

“They usually bought from you,” Jinsoul explained. She let go of her hand. “The heads of the house wanted heirlooms, both for their descendants and our closest allies. It’s stayed that way.” 

“Then how’d you get Ecl—me?”

“The older Jinsoul,” she started, “she went after the last part of the arsenal. Eclipse was missing, but they’d known you’d been made and then stolen. The story isn’t exactly clear if she bought you back, if you’d been given back, or if you’d been stolen.”

The girl chuckled. “Either way, it’s probably led to me turning back into—well, me.” The smile faded. “Thank you. Even if you don’t know how it happened, I’m finally something close to human again.” She looked at her hands again. “But I think the spell, curse, or enchantment—whatever it is, is still there.” 

“Magic’s come farther since even then,” Jinsoul said. “I’m pretty sure there’s a way out.” 

“From what I remember, it was a combination of spells,” she replied. “And magic I’d never even known existed.” Her brow furrowed. “The actual spells weren’t anything I recognised or could probably tell you.” 

“Transfiguration like that is pretty illegal,” Jinsoul told her. “We have laws against it now, so unless they’d end up arresting me, we could contact people to try and fix this.” 

“We’ll see.” The girl sighed. “But for right now, I’d like to get out of this place.” She shuddered. “This’s where it happened.”

Jinsoul straightened and nodded. “I’ll figure something out.” She looked up at the hole. “Can I ask you something first?”

“I’ll probably be asking you more questions, so,” she trailed off, nodding. There was a bit more irritation there. “Ask.”

“What’s your name?” Jinsoul asked. “I don’t think Eclipse would be all that fitting anymore.” 

The corner of her lip tilted up. “Jungeun.”