Chapter 15: No Light Without Flame

  The storm above Tartarus raged like a wounded god. Ash swirled in the sky. Red lightning forked through the black. And beneath it all, the battlefield writhed.

  Rizer stood chest-heaving, knees bent, arms cracked with psionic current that refused to settle. The last enemy he struck was no ordinary Odryix, this one was older, leaner, smarter. And it hadn’t died easy.

  "That was too close," muttered Mara, wiping a long line of blood from her cheek as she crouched beside a fallen comrade. His eyes were open, but his chest no longer rose. "We lost Calen."

  The name struck deep. Calen, one of their sharpest minds, a strategist who once joked in the quiet. Dead now. Like dozens more.

  But there was no time to mourn.

  A tremor rolled through the earth, followed by a crackling shriek. From the hill above, an Odryix general emerged, this one cloaked in a deep violet shell, taller than the rest, laced with silver bio-armor that pulsed with stolen human energy.

  "That's Xiral," whispered Commander Arlen. "One of Ankura's own. He absorbs power from pain. Don't let him near the wounded."

  Rizer felt his heartbeat slip into a strange rhythm. Slower. Deeper. Like something ancient waking inside him.

  Behind him, Elias screamed.

  Rizer turned just in time to see Elias flung back by a shockwave of energy, his body crashing into rock, bones cracking. But then—something shifted.

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  Elias didn’t stay down.

  He rose, slowly, bleeding from the mouth, arms trembling, but eyes glowing so fiercely they drowned the lightning.

  The very air around him warped.

  “Elias?” Rizer called out, but the name barely reached. Elias’s mind wasn’t in that moment. Something else had taken over.

  He walked straight into the heart of the battle like a ghost set aflame.

  Xiral saw him coming and smiled. “A child dares—”

  And then Elias screamed, but it wasn’t human.

  It was raw sound. Ancient power. The rocks beneath his feet shattered. Soldiers, Odryix and human alike, stumbled, ears bleeding.

  Elias leapt.

  One punch. One single punch, glowing with unearthly heat, landed on Xiral’s chest..and caved it in.

  The Odryix general collapsed, twitching. Not dead, but reduced. For the first time, the battlefield fell quiet.

  And then, an explosion.

  A section of the ridge erupted. Another wave of Odryix poured through.

  “We can’t win this!” shouted Arlen. “Fall back! Regroup at the underground base!”

  The retreat began, but not everyone made it.

  Rizer ran for Elias, who’d collapsed, his powers burnt out. Mara dragged Calen’s body, tears streaking her face. And behind them, a brave few stayed to buy time.

  One of them was Dax. Rizer saw it all.

  Dax looked over his shoulder once, gave Rizer a nod. No words. Just understanding.

  Then he turned, strapped a bomb to his chest, and ran headfirst into the oncoming horde.

  The explosion lit the night.

  Hours Later – Underground Tunnels, Earth

  Adelpha Rae held the schematic in her hands. "They’re pushing too hard," she muttered. “And they’ve already lost too much.”

  The rebels around her were pale, starving, but determined.

  "We strike soon," she said. "We rise from below. Because roots? Roots crack stone.”

  Gaia-9 – Council Room

  Someone was lying.

  The traitor sat at the roundtable. Nobody knew who yet. But reports from Tartarus were delayed. Tampered with.

  The traitor was feeding Ankura information. And they were sitting just feet away from the High Council’s chair.