DISCLAIMER: I do not own Dr. Stone! :)


To my awesome reviewers (07/03/20): Hello, Kirana Retsu, karin150301, Evelyn (9001668), and Lu-chan 16Love! ^_^ Thank you so much and muchas gracias for reviewing the eighteenth chapter of No Stone Unturned! Chrome esta siempre entusiasmado acerca del metal :D Kohaku no confiar en Gen ahora porque el es con Tsukasa, tan ella sera desconfiada por mucho tiempo! That's the way Senku and Kohaku's relationship will develop, a lot of little moments that will lead to not-so-little moments :) Their conversation about Gen in the shed of science didn't happen in the manga or anime; that was one of my original scenes :D I'm glad you like reading about Senku's thoughts! :) They'll finally get their iron after so much iron sand collecting and ramen cooking! :D I hope all you enjoy this new chapter, and thank you again! ^_^


Chapter Nineteen: (S01 E09c) Creating Iron


The next morning, Senku and the others got to work – after he had a private word with Asagiri Gen, who had only been too happy to tell him that Senku's life was in his hands. While the fraud magician's intent was no doubt to instill some fear in him, Senku was far too focused on his goals for the day.

Senku had worn a protective apron of extra sturdy animal hide to prevent himself from being injured while pouring the melted iron into the wooden molds he had prepared in advance. Due to the rapidly cooling weather, the melted iron solidified quite quickly, allowing them to make the first two bars of iron in the stone world.

Senku smiled in satisfaction. He had seen iron in countless forms in his own era, but had to admit that no iteration of the twenty-sixth element of the periodic table that he had ever encountered in the past was quite as rewarding to see as the two simple, unassuming bars that he, Chrome, Kohaku, and Suika had made from the iron sand they had struggled to collect for eight whole weeks.

However, while his own reaction was fairly understated, the same could not be said of the others.

"Finally, we acquired iron!" Chrome yelled in triumph as he held up the first iron bar, while Kohaku expressed her happiness in the form of a delighted murmur.

"Iron! Iron! Iron!" sang Suika, dancing in a circle around him, holding out her small arms in glee as she celebrated with the rest. Ganen, who was standing nearby, likely had no idea at all what they wanted the iron for, but he was looking curiously at what Chrome held in his hand.

Gen chose to interrupt the moment with more insinuations about how important his role was in Senku's continued stay in the land of the living, but backtracked hastily when Suika asked a perfectly innocent question about a word she had never heard before.

After giving Suika a genuinely embarrassed apology, Gen continued slyly, "While ramen does taste good, I wouldn't want to work that hard for it every single day. I'd still pick Tsukasa at the end of the day~"

And that was when Kohaku issued her third death threat against Gen.

"Does a selfish, flimsy, thin-willed, worthless man like you really deserve to live, Asagiri Gen?" she hissed, smiling menacingly as she held out her daggers. "Death surely would be a better fate… or imprisonment, at the very least…"

Senku who was climbing the ladder to the shed of science, wasn't truly surprised that she had done so, but he did notice that she was not holding her weapons pointed down, in order to be able to strike at a moment's notice. Instead, Kohaku gripped her daggers in her hands while they were pointed up, as if she were holding Western eating utensils from the modern era and Gen were a particularly tasty meal.

Heh. Kohaku won't know what that looks like, but Gen will.

And it seemed he certainly did, because Gen didn't look nearly as confident after that.


Several scientific preparations and one fraud magician's performance later, Senku, Chrome, Kohaku, Suika, and Gen ran as fast as they could out of the forest and past wide open fields.

Unfortunately, a lightning storm had started almost immediately after Senku had found the block of copper in Chrome's collection. While Senku did need lightning for his plans, it would have been far more preferable for it to have arrived after he had established several lightning rods in high places… although that would have meant needing enough iron bars to tie to all of them. Because the only had two bars, and because the lightning was already here, they had to run.

After she had gotten directions from Chrome, Kohaku, with her typical speed, had taken the lead, with Chrome behind her and Suika after him, sometime running, sometimes rolling inside her watermelon mask.

I still… have to… figure out… how she does that… thought Senku haltingly, panting as he tried to keep up.

However, he and Gen both lagged behind. Being from the modern era, Senku and Gen weren't used to such extreme physical exertion. While pumping oxygen for the iron had exhausted Senku, hasn't been trying to work fast enough to catch up to lightning at the time.

Now, Senku was trying his best to run as fast as he could, but it said something about his stamina when a self-proclaimed mentalist wearing bothersome traditional robes and running barefoot was still able to slightly outpace him… even though Chrome and Gen both had objects tied to their backs.

At long last, they arrived at the base of what Chrome had referred to as a "bald mountain." Senku was relieved that they were closer than ever to magnets, and therefore, electricity… but he was so exhausted from all that running he could barely even stand, let alone climb.

But for science, Senku would do anything.

He reached out with one arm to touch the mountain…

…only to stop when Kohaku held her own arm out, blocking him.

What…?

"Senku," she said seriously as she held his gaze, "we need to climb this mountain quickly, right?"

"Yeah; we need to get to the top as soon as possible," Senku replied, wondering why she had stopped him. "We need to hurry so that we can get there before the lightning stops."

At his reply, Kohaku nodded in determination, and Senku thought that was that…

…until she grabbed his shoulders and turned him around, and before Senku knew it, he was being… carried… up the mountain?

"Kohaku!"


(End of Chapter Nineteen.) (07/03/20.)


I. My personal comments: They finally have the iron they worked so hard to gather iron sand for! ^_^ I didn't include her second death threat in this fanfic, but it happened between Chapters Seventeen and Eighteen. It was only while writing this chapter that I noticed that Kohaku had held her weapons like that, like she was going to tear into Gen and eat him for breakfast O.o What did you think of her protectiveness and of Senku's stamina? :D Kohaku carrying Senku up the mountain is a manga-only moment :D Wish it had happened in the anime, too... XD

II. A tiny request: Thank you for reading my fanfic! :D If you've read this far, I hope you'll consider taking an extra minute to leave a review for Chapter Nineteen ("Creating Iron")? :D Reviews really mean a lot to me as a fanfiction writer, and all forms of constructive criticism are welcome! Even if it's the year 5738 or something, I would love to hear your thoughts on this chapter! :D (By the way, I'm "fireflyhwufanficwrit" on Reddit and "firefly-hwufanficwriterrrrr" on Tumblr :D)