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The most valuable ideas, however, came from the actual work--seeing and experiencing the process of melting metal down and making casts for the armor. Apart from simply enjoying himself, Hector began to conceptualize the creation of his iron differently. He tried making it into a process as well. Rather than merely visualizing some iron shape in his mind, he instead visualized it being melted down from a powder and then reformed and cooled into the desired shape.

And to an extent, it actually worked. It took longer to form something, but when the iron appeared in his hand, it was a quite passable cube. He did it again with a sphere, then a pyramid, then a rectangular prism. Garovel made him try for an icosahedron, and after finding out what it looked like, Hector struggled for about half an hour before Garovel started laughing at him, at which point he gave up and flipped the reaper off.

Practical experience also seemed to help. Hector made a concentrated effort to take criminals down using mainly iron. If firearms were a factor, he made them into iron bricks first, and then went about binding the attackers’ limbs. If a victim or witness was involved, then Hector escorted them to the nearest police station along with the subdued perpetrator.

Unfortunately, it did not always go smoothly. More than once, he accidentally broke a criminal’s arm or leg, even when all they had done wrong was a bit of burglary. Garovel tried to only focus on murderers, but those were not nearly as easy to find, even with the reaper’s ability to see deathly auras.

‘Most murders are crimes of passion after all,’ said Garovel. ‘And in those cases, I won’t see an aura of death around the victim until maybe a minute before they die.’

‘That kinda sucks, Garovel...’

‘Hey, it’s the best I’ve got.’