The hierarchies of Outpost Vester were not written down.
They didn't need to be.
Power had a way of announcing itself—through posture, through deference, through the sudden silence that fell when certain people entered a room.
At the top stood three figures, immovable as mountains:
Adept Commander Atheon—the Fist of Men, forged in countless Shroud campaigns, loyal to no house but respected by all.
Adept Commander Vaelith Crownhold—scion of House Crownhold, whose family name carried weight across the Republic's northern territories.
Adept Commander Rowan Kadesh—not nobility by birth, but a vassal to House Kadesh, elevated through merit and blood.
Three adepts. Three factions. Three centers of gravity around which every soldier, every initiate, every fledgling in Vester orbited.
Everyone else—no matter how talented, how experienced, how deadly—was initiate rank at best.
And initiates, no matter how skilled, were still just pieces on a board controlled by adepts.
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