Morning broke like a blade of pale gold across the horizon sharp, cold, unforgiving.
Mist curled around the clearing outside Darius Hallow's den, drifting between trees whose roots coiled like sleeping titans. Kael Veyrn stood at the entrance with frost on his breath, exhaustion still clinging to him like a second skin.
Behind him, Iria Nox adjusted her cloak, hiding the tremor in her hands. Rai Kuroda flexed the fingers of his repaired cybernetic arm blue sparks jumping beneath metal plating.
At the treeline, Darius stood perfectly still.
His golden eyes reflected the sunrise like a predator watching prey awaken.
He didn't turn. He didn't blink.
"Kael. With me."
Kael exchanged one silent look with Iria. fear, hope, something unspoken and followed Darius into the forest.
The team parted.
Four paths.
Four battles.
Tessa Wyn watched them disappear with a knot in her throat.
The days of forging had begun.
THE LONG WALK
They walked for hours.
The deeper they ventured, the older the forest became. trees rising like pillars of forgotten gods. Sunlight dimmed into thin blades piercing the vast canopy. The air thickened, heavy with ancient moss and earth that had not been disturbed in centuries.
By midday, the forest swallowed all sense of time.
Kael's legs burned. His chest throbbed where the Void had nearly torn him apart. Darius never slowed. Not once.
By late afternoon, when shadows stretched long and thin, they entered a circular clearing ringed by towering stone pillars. Each pillar bore runes carved in the likeness of extinct beasts titans of the old world, their myths long erased by the Dominion.
Darius finally stopped.
His voice rolled like thunder trapped beneath the earth.
"Your training begins here."
"First lesson," Darius said, "your body is the cage. Strengthen the cage… or the beast inside you will rip you open."
Kael inhaled shakily.
"What do I do?"
Darius didn't answer.
His tattoos ignited, primal Aether pulsing across his skin. The ground vibrated beneath their feet. Behind Kael, a monstrous stone bull shuddered.
Cracks split its surface.
Then it roared to life, charging forward with a thunderous bellow.
Kael dove aside barely. The beast's horn tore a trench in the dirt where he'd stood.
"Again," Darius growled.
The bull charged. Kael's instincts flared Void Aether flickering in his hands
"No!" Darius barked. "Not the Void. Not until you control yourself."
Kael dodged, stumbling, the bull grazing his shoulder hard enough to spin him.
"This is" He gasped. "impossible"
Darius slammed him to the ground with one hand, pinning him like a struggling animal.
"Strength without discipline is ash."
He leaned closer.
"And fear feeds the Void."
He stood back, pointing at the bull.
"Rise."
Pain clawed through Kael's ribs, but he stood. He faced the bull.
The earth trembled as it charged again.
This time, Kael didn't retreat.
He waited breath steady, mind focused
stepped aside at the precise second
and slammed his shoulder into its flank.
The beast shattered into rubble.
Darius didn't praise him.
But something flickered in his eyes.
Approval.
Or recognition.
"Good. Tomorrow, your real battle begins."
The sun bled molten orange behind the treetops as they set camp beneath an ancient oak whose branches twisted like gnarled claws.
Darius returned moments later with a deer its neck snapped clean. A spectral tiger of Aether prowled behind him before dissolving into smoke.
He roasted the deer without ceremony.
Kael ate in silence, shoulders aching, body trembling at the thought of tomorrow.
Darius watched him through the flames.
"You survived day one," he said. "Few do."
The flames crackled.
"Sleep. Tomorrow the forest hunts you back."
IRIA NOX THE SHADOW'S PRICEMEETING THE PHANTOMThe abandoned skyscraper pierced the clouds like a rusted spear forgotten by the heavens.
Iria climbed alone through its hollow interior past shattered drones, scorched walls, and hallways where wind howled like restless spirits.
Hour passed. she reached the rooftop.
Silent.
Empty.
She tapped her comm.
"Veyla Xirion. I'm here."
Nothing.
A shift of air.
Cold steel kissed her throat.
"Rule one," a quiet voice whispered, "never trust shadows you didn't cast yourself."
Iria dissolved phasing into distortion reappearing meters away with her resonance blade drawn.
Veyla Xirion stood where she had been tall, elegant, lethal, one cybernetic eye glowing with a violet crosshair.
"You pass the first test," Veyla murmured.
Then she lunged.
Plasma daggers sang through the air so sharp they cut through Iria's after-images. Iria blinked in and out of existence, barely avoiding each strike.
But Veyla was faster.
A partial phased dagger slipped through Iria's guard, slicing her ribs open with a burning sting.
"Too slow," Veyla whispered behind her.
"And too emotional."
Iria countered with a strike that forced Veyla back a step.
For the first time, Veyla smiled.
"You have someone you want to protect. Good. That makes you predictable."
Heat rose in Iria's chest but she said nothing.
"Payment," Veyla said.
Iria transferred the credits. The hologram flickered between them.
"Follow me."
They stepped into the rooftop elevator.
It descended a full minute into a hidden facility pulsing with violet circuitry and training drones shaped like wraiths.
"Your training begins tonight," Veyla said.
"And tomorrow, you kill your first contract."
Iria's breath hitched.
"Who?"
"A Syndicate warlord."
Veyla's smile grew razor sharp.
"Garron Myles."
Iria trained until her vision blurred learning to phase limbs, weapons, even parts of her heartbeat. Veyla corrected her with brutal precision.
Later, they ate in cold silence.
Tomorrow, Iria would take a life.
And she feared what it would make her.
RAI KURODA THE WARDEN'S STORMTHE DAY'S JOURNEY
Rai traveled for a full day.
Forests gave way to steel plains.
Steel plains became towering fortresses.
Thunderheads gathered above as storm towers pulsed with Aether lightning.
By dusk, he reached the Citadel gates.
A drill sergeant barked at him.
"Name!"
"Rai Kuroda."
"Ability?"
"Stormcaller."
"Prove it."
Rai lifted his cybernetic arm.
Lightning speared the clouds.
A stunned silence followed.
"…Accepted."
The gauntlet began immediately:
• electrified obstacle fields
• armored combatants wielding shock batons
• Aether-suppression chambers that suffocated his lungs
• lightning precision grids
• shock endurance trials that blistered skin and metal
Half the recruits collapsed by sundown.
Rai didn't.
At day's end, a towering figure stepped onto the balcony.
White-streaked hair.
Half-metal face.
Armor humming with chained storms.
Orion Draeven the Arc Warden.
He studied Rai with cold calculation.
"So. You survived day one."
A pause.
"Impressive."
Rai stepped forward, exhausted but unbroken.
"I want personal training."
"Why?"
Rai's fists tightened.
"To kill Solis Kane."
For the first time, Orion smiled sharp, predatory.
"Then you belong to me now."
THE AWAKENING OF EVE-03THE DOMINION'S NEW HUNTER
Deep beneath the Dominion Citadel, a containment pod hissed open.
Blue mist spilled out.
A girl stepped forward pale, unnervingly still. Veins glowed faint reactor-blue beneath her skin. Metallic filaments threaded through her muscles. Her eyes gleamed not with life, but calculation.
Eve-03.
The Dominion's Artificial Aetherial Being.
A scientist bowed.
"Directive: locate and retrieve Kael Veyrn."
Eve blinked.
"What is he?"
"A threat.
A mistake.
A power we must never allow to grow."
Eve tilted her head.
"So I must kill him?"
"Only if necessary. But you must reach him before Solis Kane does."
The lights flickered.
Eve's voice softened almost curious.
"I will find the boy with the Void."
She stepped forward.
And vanished like a candle snuffed by the dark.