The silence in Station Zero was heavy, pressing against the ears like deep water.
It had been twelve hours since the destruction of the Seraphim. The Iron Legion had retreated to the safety of the deep tunnels, sealing the blast doors behind them with layers of lead and welded steel.
Varian sat on the edge of the central platform, his legs dangling over the tracks. He wasn't wearing the full Abyssal Armor. The helmet and gauntlets had retracted into his skin, leaving him in a bodysuit of shifting gray mesh—the manifestation of his new Twilight form.
He stared at his hands.
When he clenched his left fist, shadows swirled between his fingers—cold, hungry, ancient. When he clenched his right fist, sparks of golden light danced—warm, burning, absolute.
"You're vibrating," a small voice said.
Varian looked down. Echo was sitting on the step below him. The blind hybrid girl was holding her hands over her large, bat-like ears.
"It's loud," she whispered. "Inside you. It sounds like... two storms crashing together."
"Does it hurt?" Varian asked softly.
"No. It sounds... sad."
Varian sighed. He looked at the Sun-Piercer resting beside him. The spear was dormant, but the Prism Scale at its tip still caught the ambient light, splitting it into faint rainbows.
"I killed an Angel today, Echo," Varian said. "But it wasn't a monster. It was a person. A woman trapped in a jar."
Echo tilted her head. "Did you set her free?"
"I think so."
"Then it's not sad," Echo decided, reaching out to pat his knee. "It's just quiet. Quiet is good."
Footsteps approached. Heavy, grinding footsteps.
Gorgon walked up, his stone skin chipped and scarred from the battle in the factory. The red Crimson Paladin armor was dormant on his body, appearing as dull, rusted plates fused to his granite flesh.
"Architect is ready," Gorgon rumbled. "He cracked the Angel's brain."
Varian stood up. The gray energy stabilized.
"Let's go see what the Church is hiding."
The Architect's lab was a frenzy of activity.
The old man had connected the Data Core—a crystalline hard drive Rix had scavenged from the wreckage of the Angel—to the station's mainframe. Dozens of screens flickered with streams of gold binary code.
"Beautiful," The Architect muttered, typing furiously with three hands (he had built a mechanical third arm onto his back to help multitask). "The encryption is based on hymnal frequencies. They literally locked their secrets with a song."
"Can you open it?" Lady Venom asked, leaning against a workbench. She was nursing a burn on her tail, applying a cooling salve.
"I can open anything," The Architect scoffed. "I just have to sing the right note in reverse."
He slammed a key.
HUMMM.
The screens flashed white. Then, a map appeared.
It wasn't a map of the tunnels. It was a map of Ouroboros.
It showed the world as a massive, multi-layered sphere.
Top Layer: The Celestial Spire (The Church).
Middle Layer: The Industrial Belt & Rust-Jungle (The Union).
Lower Layer: The Prison & Sewers (The Dregs).
Bottom Layer: The Wilds (The Green Hell).
Center:The Zero Point.
Three glowing red dots pulsed on the map.
"The Keys," Varian whispered.
"Correct," The Architect spun his chair around. "The Sovereign's hologram told us the Zero Point is locked. To open the Core and reset the world—or save it—you need three Authority Codes. Physical keys held by the rulers of this world."
He pointed to the first dot, located at the very top of the spire.
"Key One: The Halo. Held by the High Pontiff in the Sanctum of Light. It controls the atmospheric stabilizers and the orbital lasers."
He pointed to the second dot, moving slowly around the Industrial Belt.
"Key Two: The Engine. Held by the Union's supreme leader, the Bio-Emperor. It is located on his mobile fortress, the Land-Ship Leviathan."
Varian frowned. "And the third?"
The Architect pointed to the bottom. Deep in the Wilds.
"Key Three: The Heart. Held by the Apex Predator of the Core Jungle. The Dragon King."
The room went silent.
"A Dragon," Rix whimpered from the ceiling. "Big lizard. Fire breath. No thank you."
"We can't go up," Varian analyzed the map. "The Church knows our energy signature now. If we get close to the Spire, they'll glass us from orbit. And the Union... the Bio-Emperor moves his fortress constantly. We'd be walking into a trap."
"So we go down," Gorgon concluded. "Into the Wilds."
"The Wilds are suicide," Venom hissed. "It's not just beasts. The air is 90% spore content. The gravity fluctuates. And the plants eat people."
"We have to go there anyway," Varian said. "The Dragon King has a Key. If we get it, we control one-third of the world's systems. It gives us leverage."
He looked at his team.
"Besides... if we stay here, they will eventually drill through the ceiling. We need to disappear into the jungle where their scanners can't find us."
"Disappear?" Scrap-Jack walked in, wiping grease from his face. "How do you plan to move three thousand refugees, a ton of ammo, and a hydroponic garden through a jungle that eats metal?"
Varian looked at the map. He looked at the massive tunnel networks leading down.
"We don't walk," Varian said. "We drive."
Varian led them to the main rail yard of the station.
Sitting there was the wreckage of the boring-train, battered and scorched from the factory assault. And next to it, the massive armored steam-train that Mama Ferro had used.
"We combine them," Varian said.
He turned to Scrap-Jack.
"You're the Warlord of the Forge. I want you to build me a ship. But not for water."
Varian sketched a shape in the dust on a crate.
"A Land-Battleship. Amphibious tracks for the mud. Boring drills for the mountains. Airtight hull for the spores. And big enough to carry the Legion."
Scrap-Jack looked at the sketch. He looked at the trains. He looked at the piles of scrap metal and Roach-Shells they had harvested.
His mechanical eyes whirred. A grin spread across his oily face.
"A mobile fortress," Scrap-Jack whispered. "With turrets? And a reactor core?"
"The Architect will help you with the engine," Varian said. "We can use the Geothermal Core we stole from the factory before it blew. It still has charge."
"It will take weeks," Scrap-Jack warned.
"You have one week," Varian said. "Because that's how long it will take the Church to dig us out."
"One week to build a Titan," Scrap-Jack cracked his hydraulic knuckles. "I'm going to need a lot of coffee. And welding rods."
Three days passed.
The station was a hive of frantic industry. The sound of grinders and welders never stopped. The skeleton of the Iron Sovereign—the massive land-ship—was taking shape. It looked like a cross between a tank and a cathedral, covered in green roach-armor and black steel.
Varian was overseeing the installation of the main gun (a refurbished Union artillery cannon) when the perimeter alarm tripped.
BEEP-BEEP-BEEP.
"Contact," Rix announced over the PA. "North Tunnel. One signal."
"One?" Varian tapped his headset. "Is it a scout?"
"No," Rix sounded confused. "Signal is... weird. It's broadcasting a code. Old code."
Varian frowned. "What code?"
"Batch 4. Unit 744."
Varian froze.
He dropped the wrench he was holding.
Only three people knew that number. Himself. Dr. Valerius. And one other.
"Open the blast doors," Varian ordered, his voice cold. "But keep the guns aimed."
Varian walked to the North Gate. Gorgon and Venom flanked him, weapons ready.
The heavy steel doors groaned open, revealing the dark, misty tunnel beyond.
Standing in the spotlight was a figure.
He wore a tattered Union officer's coat, stolen and repurposed. His hair was long and white, contrasting with his pale skin. He leaned on a cane made of bone.
Perched on his shoulder was a creature. A bat. But not a normal bat. It was the size of a hawk, with crimson fur and eyes that glowed like embers.
[Genetic Archivist Scan.][Subject: Human (Hybrid).][Identity: Silas (Batch 4, Unit 745).][Beast: Vampire Bat King (Warrior Rank).]
Varian stared.
"Silas," Varian whispered.
The boy—man, now—looked up. He had a scar running from his lip to his ear, twisting his face into a permanent, cynical smirk.
"Hello, Meat," Silas drawled. His voice was smooth, cultured, but carrying an undercurrent of violence. "You look... expensive. Nice armor. Did you steal it?"
"I earned it," Varian said, stepping forward. The Sun-Piercer materialized in his hand. "I thought you died in the explosion."
"I almost did," Silas shrugged. He petted the bat on his shoulder. "But Nosferatu here pulled me out of the rubble. We've been... traveling. Watching."
Silas looked past Varian, at the station, at the massive land-ship under construction.
"You've been busy, Varian. Building a kingdom. Fighting Angels. Becoming a 'Monarch'."
Silas spat on the floor.
"You always were the teacher's pet. Even when the teacher was torturing us."
"What do you want, Silas?" Gorgon growled, stepping forward. "If you're here to beg, the soup kitchen is in the back."
Silas looked at the giant. He didn't flinch. His eyes flashed red.
"Beg? No. I'm here to offer a trade."
"We don't need anything you have," Venom hissed.
"Don't you?"
Silas tapped his cane on the ground.
From the darkness of the tunnel behind him, movement rippled.
Hundreds of red eyes opened in the dark.
[Enemy Scan: Vampire Bat Swarm.][Count: 500+.]
"My swarm controls the upper airways of the sewers," Silas said casually. "I hear everything. I know things even your Rat-Spy doesn't know."
He looked Varian in the eye.
"I know where the Bio-Emperor docks his ship."
Varian stilled. That was Key Two.
"And," Silas continued, "I know a back door into the Wilds that doesn't involve driving off a cliff. A route the beasts use."
"Why tell us?" Varian asked. "You hate me. You always have."
"I do," Silas admitted. "I hate you because you survived better than I did. I hate you because you have hope, and I only have hunger."
He touched his chest.
"But I hate Valerius more."
Silas's face twisted. The smirk vanished, replaced by a raw, bleeding hate.
"He didn't just drain my blood, Varian. He experimented on my brain. He tried to turn me into a remote-controlled soldier. I still hear his commands in my sleep."
Silas stepped forward, crossing the threshold of the gate.
"You're going to war with the world. I want in. I want to be there when you pull Valerius out of his hole. I want to be the one who drains him dry."
Varian looked at Silas. He saw the same damaged, desperate child who used to sit in the cage next to him. But he also saw a predator.
"If I let you in," Varian said, "You follow my orders. You break the chain of command, and I will put you down."
"I don't follow orders well," Silas smirked again, the mask returning. "But for the sake of killing the Doctor... I'll play soldier."
Varian lowered his spear.
"Open the gate fully," Varian ordered the guards.
He looked at Silas.
"Welcome to the Iron Legion. Try not to eat the crew."
Silas walked in, his swarm of bats fluttering in the darkness behind him like a cloak.
"No promises, Varian. No promises."
That night, the map table was crowded.
Silas stood on the opposite side of Varian. Gorgon and Venom watched him like hawks. The Architect was fascinated by Silas's bat, trying to measure its wingspan with a laser caliper.
"The route is here," Silas pointed to a fissure on the map, deep in Sector 6. "The Obsidian Ravine. It's a fault line that leads directly into the canopy of the Core Jungle. It's narrow, dark, and full of Shadow-Stalkers. But it bypasses the Union blockades."
"Shadow-Stalkers," Rix shivered. "Nasty cats. Invisible."
"We can handle cats," Gorgon grunted.
"The problem isn't the cats," Silas said. "It's the Gatekeeper."
"Gatekeeper?" Varian asked.
"The entrance to the Ravine is guarded. Not by a beast. By a man."
Silas projected an image from his memory onto the table.
It was a lone figure sitting on a rock in the middle of the chasm. He wore rags, but across his lap lay a massive, rusted greatsword.
[Analysis: Unknown Entity.][Energy Signature: Sword Saint.]
"They call him The Exile," Silas explained. "He's been down there for twenty years. He kills anything that tries to enter the Wilds. Beast or Human."
"Why?"
"Because he says the Wilds are sacred. And we are the disease."
Varian looked at the image. A lone swordsman holding back the tide of monsters.
"He sounds strong," Varian said.
"He chopped a Behemoth in half with one swing," Silas said. "I saw it."
"Then we have to convince him," Varian said. "Or move him."
"We leave in three days," Varian announced. "Scrap-Jack, double the shifts on the Iron Sovereign. Venom, stock up on antidotes. Silas, map the Ravine."
Varian looked at the ceiling of the station.
"We are leaving the nest," Varian whispered. "And we aren't coming back until we own the sky."