Days crept slow in the workshop’s hush, once alive with chisel’s song, now a crypt of dust and stillness. Elias felt the factory’s hum in his bones—a ceaseless taunt, a world that had shed him. His tools lay idle, their edges dulled by want, yearning for purpose he could scarce recall.

  He ventured out, Redstone’s streets heavy with his tread. A new shop gleamed ahead, its glass aglow with rows of chairs—perfect, lifeless, each a twin to the next. Elias stopped, bile rising sharp—machine-wrought, polished mockeries of hands like his. Could folk trade care for this cold gleam?

  “How’d they turn so swift?” he muttered, fists tight, rage a coal in his chest. The machines stole more than coin—they took pride, the mark of men who’d shaped wood true. He thought of his father, his gruff laugh over a lathe—gone now, spared this shame.

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  “Elias?” A voice broke his storm. Mr. Harding neared, face lined with unease, a man Elias had carved for years. His presence stung—loyalty lost to steel.

  “Seen your stock,” Elias said, voice taut, masking the hurt clawing within.

  Harding nodded, eyes averted. “I’m sorry, Elias. The machines—they’re practical. Your work’s fine, but too dear.”

  Elias’s breath caught, a blade in his ribs. “Practical?” he snapped. “They’ve no life—no grain a man’s hand knew.” Harding’s pity burned worse than scorn—once a friend, now a stranger clad in guilt.

  “I’d have it else,” Harding sighed, turning away, steps fading soft. Elias stood, the chairs’ gleam a jeer in his eyes. The world had spun past, swift and cold, leaving him a relic—yet rage stirred, not quelled.

  He felt the chisel in his pocket, its weight a vow—not of craft’s old song, but of men like his father, whose hands he’d not let fade un fought. The hum droned on, but Elias turned back, a spark unbent, kindling in the dusk.