The tiny security monitor bolted to the inside of the elevator cab displayed the end of the world.
Thousands of identical figures marched across the cracked glass screen. They wore pristine white combat armor. They carried advanced Board energy rifles. They poured out of the dark, cavernous doors of the Vatican server farm in perfect, terrifying lockstep.
It was an endless, terrifying sea of white flooding the ancient, ruined streets of Rome.
Marcus stood completely still in the harsh red emergency lighting of the elevator. The Warlord sword felt heavy in his right hand. The sharp steel edge was pressed tightly against Nero's throat.
Blood dripped steadily from the deep cut on Marcus's left bicep, soaking into the blue wool of his torn naval coat, pattering softly onto the wet concrete floor.
"Project Legion 2.0 is online," Executive Vane's voice echoed through the elevator speaker.
The original CEO of the Board sounded entirely calm. He sounded like a man reading a quarterly earnings report, not a man announcing an army of clones.
"The Bulgarian DNA is viable," Vane continued, his tone perfectly flat. "The vats are open. You won the beach, Commodus. You saved your rusted ship. But you lost the war."
Nero didn't look at the screen. He looked directly at Marcus.
His pristine white suit was soaked in blood from his shattered nose. He was gasping for air, the heavy steel blade digging slightly into his skin. But he was grinning. It was a wide, manic, terrifying smile.
A thick drop of dark red blood fell from the tip of Nero's broken nose.
It landed with a soft, metallic tink directly onto the polished steel flat of Marcus's sword.
"I told you," Nero whispered hoarsely, his breath catching in his throat. "The Warlord's math always ends in zero. You can't beat him, Emperor. You're just a Beta Tester."
Marcus didn't blink. He stared into the manic eyes of the clone.
He didn't have JARVIS to calculate the odds of five thousand starving scavengers fighting a limitless army of heavily armed Board clones. He didn't need an AI.
The math was obvious. The Legion was dead. The Carrier was dead. Rome was lost.
The intercom crackled again. Vane's voice dropped an octave, shifting from cold observation to a calculated business proposition.
"I am a pragmatist, Warlord," Vane said smoothly. "I don't waste assets if I don't have to. You fought well. You provided excellent combat data for the new models."
Marcus tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword.
"I will offer you a severance package," Vane continued. "Surrender the Warlord title. Surrender the aircraft carrier and its population to my salvage teams. And hand over the Butcher."
Lucilla, standing thirty feet away on the concrete walkway near the broken water terminal, let out a sharp, terrified gasp. She clutched her datapad to her chest, her eyes wide with horror.
"Do that," Vane's voice filled the cavern, "and I will allow you and your General to live. I will grant you permanent exile in the terraformed jungles of Naples. You can play survivor for the rest of your natural life. But you will never set foot in Rome."
Silence fell over the subterranean lake, broken only by the deafening roar of the high-pressure water pipe still dumping freezing water onto the crushed Burner clones outside the elevator.
Nero laughed. It was a wet, coughing sound.
"Take the deal, Warlord," Nero taunted, his eyes shining with manic glee. "Go live in the mud with your scarred girlfriend. You aren't a god. You're just a glitch in Vane's code."
Marcus looked at the security monitor. He looked at the endless wave of white armor marching out of the Vatican.
Then, he looked back at Nero.
The Warlord's face didn't twist in anger. He didn't yell. He didn't monologue about honor or the glory of Rome.
His expression hardened into absolute, terrifying iron.
Executive Vane was a businessman. Vane understood leverage, assets, and acceptable losses. He thought Marcus was a survivor who would take any deal to keep breathing.
Marcus wasn't a survivor anymore. He was Warlord Commodus.
And Warlords didn't negotiate with spreadsheets. They sent messages in blood.
Marcus didn't look at the camera. He looked directly into Nero's eyes.
"The Legion doesn't surrender," Marcus said. His voice was cold, quiet, and carried the crushing weight of an Emperor.
He didn't pull the sword back. He didn't hesitate.
Marcus violently twisted his wrists, dropping the angle of the heavy steel blade in a fraction of a second.
He didn't swing at Nero's throat.
He brought the Warlord sword down in a blinding, terrifyingly fast vertical arc directly onto Nero's right arm.
The polished steel sheared completely through the pristine white sleeve of the suit. It effortlessly bit through the clone's genetically enhanced muscle, snapped through the radius and ulna bones, and cleanly severed the flesh.
Nero's right hand—the hand that had held the Warlord sword, the hand that had ordered the burning of the beach—hit the metal floor of the elevator with a heavy, wet thud.
For one second, there was absolute silence.
Nero simply stared at the bloody stump of his wrist. His manic grin vanished, replaced by sheer, uncomprehending shock.
Then, the clone screamed.
It was a high, tearing, agonizing shriek of pure analog pain. Nero collapsed to his knees, clutching the spurting stump to his chest, his pristine suit instantly soaking dark red. He curled into a tight ball on the floor of the cab, sobbing uncontrollably.
Over the intercom, Vane's calm, measured breathing abruptly stopped.
The original CEO was entirely silent. He hadn't predicted the Warlord's math.
Marcus calmly wiped the bloody edge of the Warlord sword against his torn naval coat.
He stepped over the screaming clone.
He kicked the severed hand out of the elevator cab. It skittered across the wet concrete walkway, stopping inches from the dead Burner clones.
Marcus looked directly up into the small security camera mounted in the corner of the elevator ceiling.
His dark eyes were devoid of mercy.
"Keep your clones in Rome, Vane," Marcus spoke directly into the lens, his voice a low, terrifying rumble. "Because I'm coming to burn the Vatican to the ground."
Marcus didn't wait for a reply.
He reached out and slammed his bloody palm against the heavy, rusted metal button on the elevator control panel.
The heavy steel doors groaned loudly. They began to slide shut, slowly cutting off the red emergency light.
Nero continued to scream, rocking back and forth on the floor in a puddle of his own blood.
Marcus stepped backward out of the cab, perfectly timing the closing doors.
The heavy steel slammed shut with a final, echoing boom, trapping the bleeding clone inside the dark shaft.
The intercom feed from Vane was instantly cut off.
Marcus turned his back on the elevator.
He walked back out onto the narrow concrete walkway. He was bleeding from his arm. He was soaking wet. But he held the Emperor's sword, and his Warlord iron was absolute.
Marcia was standing near the edge of the subterranean lake, staring at him. She didn't look horrified by the brutal amputation. She looked at him with the fierce, unwavering respect of a Roman General looking at her Warlord.
Narcissus stood silently behind her, his massively dented, cherry-red armor hissing violently as the falling water continued to cool the thick battleship steel.
Lucilla was still kneeling by the massive glass terminal, her hands shaking slightly over the datapad.
"He's sending an army," Lucilla whispered, her voice trembling. "Marcus, there are thousands of them. We can't fight that. Even with the Carrier's guns, we can't breach the Vatican."
"We'll find a way," Marcus said, sheathing the heavy Warlord sword into the scavenged leather scabbard on his back. "Right now, we have water. We secured the beachhead. The Carrier survives the week."
He walked toward the terminal to pull Lucilla up.
Before he could reach her, a massive, grinding mechanical failure echoed through the massive cavern.
It didn't come from the elevator. It didn't come from the terminal.
It came from the ceiling.
The massive, rusted industrial pipe that Narcissus had ripped open—the one currently dumping millions of gallons of freezing, high-pressure water onto the walkway—suddenly shuddered violently.
The deafening roar of the clean water abruptly changed pitch.
It stopped sounding like a high-pressure spray. It started sounding like a thick, sickening, wet slop hitting the concrete.
The temperature in the cavern suddenly dropped, replaced by a suffocating, chemical stench of rotting vegetation and heavy ozone.
Marcus stopped walking. His Warlord instincts flared.
He looked up at the broken pipe.
The water pouring from the ceiling was no longer crystal clear.
It was entirely, terrifyingly black.