The new floor opened onto dusty flats with scattered stone ridges. A squat tower-fort sat ahead. Short walls. Reinforced gate. Crude lookout post.

  

  [ TRIAL OBJECTIVE – BREACH DEFENSIVE HOLD ]

  Enemy: 23 – ORK TYPE

  Primary Goal: Breach

  Optional: Survive

  Drex and Juno crawled into cover near a low rise.

  Two Orks patrolled inside the wall. Others milled near the gate, weapons slung lazily. The rest were out of sight.

  The gnome squad stopped ten meters back. They were already scanning terrain vectors and updating range overlays.

  One of them—tallest, with a multi-lens eyepiece—spoke first.

  “Given the gate's reinforcement layering and angled structural plate, frontal assault carries a projected failure rate of eighty-one percent. Recommend deviation pattern. High-right ridge loop or sub-surface breach.”

  Juno looked at Drex.

  Drex didn't look up. He flipped a switch.

  A hatch opened on the crabwalker’s front.

  The rocket arm slid into place.

  The gnome leader tilted her head. “What—”

  Drex: “Gate’s the plan.”

  The gnome blinked. “That’s suboptimal.”

  “It’s direct,” Drex said.

  Another gnome mumbled, “That doesn’t make it better.”

  Drex locked the target.

  

  [ FIRING ]

  The rocket left the crabwalker with a deep thud, no smoke trail—just a flash and then force.

  The gate exploded inward. Cracked stone and twisted metal flew back into the fort. Three Orks were standing too close.

  Now they weren’t.

  Dust billowed out through the broken opening.

  Istel ducked instinctively at the blast. The pressure wave reached them even from cover.

  “...Did they just breach with a point-blank unguided payload?”

  One of her techs leaned out. “I didn’t even get a blast contour reading. They just—fired it.”

  The smallest gnome squinted. “I was ninety-seven percent sure they were posturing.”

  Istel just stared at the gap. “Update suppression pattern. Redirect fire lanes. Provide cover. We’re committed now.”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  The dust hadn’t even settled.

  The Orks charged.

  Fifteen of them—armored, bellowing, weapons raised. They didn’t hesitate. They didn’t regroup. They rushed.

  Drex boosted forward to draw their attention, crawling low and wide. His flamethrower hissed.

  The first four reached him in seconds.

  He swept the flame across them—left to right. One went down screaming, another staggered, armor blackened.

  The third slammed a cleaver into his side plating. The fourth leapt for his cockpit.

  Drex vented sideways, forcing heat outward. The jumper fell short, rolling across gravel.

  He raised the scattergun and fired twice—center mass. Two Orks down.

  Juno met the rest.

  The shield mech dropped like a wall in front of the next wave.

  The first Ork smashed into him with a tower blade. Juno didn’t move.

  He rammed forward, shoulder-checking the attacker. It flew backward into two others.

  A fourth Ork slipped past. Juno spun, brought the spike around, and punched it straight through the gut.

  Another tried to flank from high—scrambling up rock for elevation.

  A gnome pulse beam sliced through its chest before it landed.

  

  [ HOSTILES REMAINING: 10 ]

  Five of them peeled wide to get around. Two got caught in a rune trap laid near a boulder—purple flash, burst, and they went tumbling.

  The captain emerged from the rubble.

  Bigger. Bone armor. Axe glowing faint red from embedded core shards.

  It didn’t yell. Just walked.

  Straight toward Juno.

  Juno waited.

  The captain struck first—an overhead chop. Juno blocked. The impact sent a shudder through the frame.

  The second strike came fast—side swipe. Juno twisted the mech and caught it with the spike arm. Sparks flew.

  Drex circled, lined up, and blasted flame into the captain’s side. The bone armor sizzled.

  The captain turned.

  Juno drove the spike through the opening Drex made. It went deep. The captain twitched. Then dropped.

  

  [ GUARD CAPTAIN DOWN – TRIAL COMPLETE ]

  The crates unlocked with a low chime.

  

  [ Crate 1: Hardened Orkhide x12, Shatterbone Plates x8 ]

  [ Crate 2: Red Alloy Ingot x4, Bloodvein Cord x5 ]

  [ Crate 3: Tusk Ring (Glowing), Instinct Stone (Raw), Unknown Fluid Sample ]

  Drex popped his hatch and stepped down to inspect the gear. Juno stayed in the mech, watching the horizon.

  The gnome team approached, exo-suits venting faint pulses of blue steam. Their leader, Istel, scanned the crates with a runed gauntlet. Glyphs hovered midair.

  “That’s a full reward pool. Not bad.”

  Drex gestured toward the third crate. “Any of that familiar?”

  “The cord, maybe. Fluid’s unknown. The stone’s either trash or cursed. Hard to tell.”

  Juno leaned out. “What’s your world like?”

  “Deep crust,” she said. “Our cities are powered by heat siphons and resonance loops. You surface types like things loud and inefficient.”

  Drex raised an eyebrow. “We make do.”

  Istel glanced at his crabwalker. “That thing runs on combustion, doesn’t it?”

  “Diesel-electric hybrid.”

  The other gnome made a clicking sound. “You built a pressure-shell mech on an open exhaust system?”

  “It works,” Drex said again.

  Istel crouched near the leg. “You reinforced the joints with steel instead of shifting bands. No flow-based compensation for torque. No mana fuses. Not even basic runic stabilizers.”

  “We don’t have runes.”

  She stood. “You’ve basically duct-taped a siege engine and taught it to walk.”

  Juno chuckled.

  Drex didn’t flinch. “And yours?”

  “Ours run on patterned spell cores, guided through carved intent channels. Modular loadouts. Sympathetic feedback loops for pilot integration. Quiet. Self-correcting.”

  Juno looked at her rifle. “That pulse shot you fired—what powers it?”

  “Resonant prism, triple-braided with spark thread. Charges off the suit core. Two-minute delay between shots without a buffer upgrade.”

  Drex blinked. “Right.”

  Istel tilted her head. “You build like people who expect to die a lot.”

  “We usually do.”

  She paused. “It’s impressive, in a way.”

  Juno: “You heading deeper?”

  Istel shook her head. “We’re pulling out. Extraction node two floors back.”

  “There are exits?”

  “Side paths. They shift. You’ll find one—if you live that long.”

  Juno looked toward the next gate. “Any advice?”

  Istel glanced at the crates one last time.

  “Don’t assume you’re fighting monsters anymore. Past a certain point, the tower starts fighting you.”

  Drex: “That supposed to mean something?”

  “You’ll know when it happens.”

  She drew a rune midair. The wall beside her shimmered open, revealing a side path lined with quiet blue light.

  Before stepping through, she paused.

  “Oh. And that front launcher you’ve got? It’s going to overheat the control board if you fire another shot without cycling it.”

  She disappeared through the gate before he could ask how she knew.