Constantine stood alone in his lamplit study, the feverish letter from his mother in one hand and the impossible cold iron nail in the other. For decades, he had believed the world to be a closed system—one governed by the raw mechanics of power, ambition, and fear. His vision, sharpened by the mind of Alistair Finch, had always been one of ruthless clarity: history was an equation, politics a game, men and gods alike mere variables to be weighed and countered. Yet now, these two objects, separated by centuries and worlds yet curiously entwined, had upended everything he thought he knew.